Stultifera Navis
by Dunmer Cuss-Word
Summary: There is no Sovngarde for you when the Mad God calls you, and there is no rest for true heroes. Do you think you can outrun fate when it's written by your enemies? Don't read this if you haven't played much of Skyrim, or if you're not prepared to consult UESPWiki at some point. Reviews are welcome, flames are delicious, and your lamentations are what's best in life.
1. Eko, Eko, Azarak

_**Eko, Eko Azarak**_

_"… These are no angels of triumph and reconciliation; these are no heralds of serene justice, but the disheveled warriors of a mad vengeance. The world sinks into universal Fury. Victory is neither God's nor the Devil's: it belongs to Madness."_

_Michel Foucault, Madness & Civilization_

* * *

"We humans, we aren't born with a set purpose, we aren't made for this or that task like you Daedra—and don't let any cleric tell you otherwise, because it's pure sentimental pap. No, it's what we do that makes us who we are; our actions are what give us a definition and a purpose. A priest of Mara, if he does it right, becomes a physical agent of love and mercy. A peasant on a cabbage farm is what he is because he stays with the land and lives by it and tends it all his life, and whether he believes he can do no other thing with his two hands is inconsequential. It's the actions, you see—no one came into this world knowing what they were _supposed_to be, not even Potema herself. There is no 'supposed' in this case, no matter what anyone's father tells them."

"And what about you? What makes a hero?"

"Killing and ruination—death and destruction and lies. One man's tragedy makes another man's legend. It gets into you like any other drug or idea—it seeps into your mind, into your bones, into your nerves and every fiber of your muscle. It gets into the corners of your eyes—everywhere you see your past and your doom, all of it revolving around a sword in someone's hand. Every single damned day it walks with you; if you aren't perpetrating destruction, then you revisit it. It fills all the cracks of your waking mind, and eventually it pushes out everything else.

"Some people never quit—it becomes their engine, it drives them on and on until they find their end on the tip of someone's sword or a headsman's axe. Others, it breaks them. They are paralyzed by it, their minds always in the heat of battle no matter where their bodies actually stand; or they simply become too tired and burned out to function in civilized society." The hero paused, as though a thought just occurred to her. "No hero is fit for civilized living, to be honest. We're a necessary evil in a lot of ways, but damned if you can make us give it up."

The Mazken tilted her head, and then looked away and bit her knuckle as she thought about this. Most Daedra had at least a passing interest in the people of Nirn, but this one had an obsession to match that of any madman. It reminded the hero of the Mages in Winterhold, and of Farengar—a nice imitation of mortal curiosity.

"What do they call you, hero? Did they name you?"

A silly question, as few mortals lived without names, but it made the Dovahkiin smile. "In life, I was Mirriam Vinius, a Breton of little consequence."

#

"… And so now Nocturnal essentially owns my Bosmeri arse. Just be glad you're not one of us higher-ups."

"What does that entail?" Mirriam was hunched over with her head resting on her hands, her mouth immersed in ale foam, and her eyes on Thavrin as he told her about how he'd just saved the Thieves' Guild from damnation. "Will you be taken to her realm or something?"

"I'm not sure, actually. I think I'm supposed to become a part of her or something, like I keep existing, but only as a part of the shadows, forever watching as Nocturnal screws around and manipulates the mortal world."

Mirriam scowled. "Sounds boring."

"Yeah, just a little." Thavrin sat back in his chair, his smile fading.

"That means we'd be apart in the afterlife too… I'm pretty sure I'm supposed to end up… erm…"

"In several different places. Yeah, we might've fooled around too much with these Daedra." Thavrin stroked his beard thoughtfully, glancing at the Ring of Namira on his finger, and took another bite of apple. "Hey, maybe if we behave badly enough, we can both join Sanguine in his realms!"

"That'd be nice, but I don't know. Isn't the Dovahkiin supposed to go to Sovngarde or something like that?"

"Nah, that's only for true Nords. You're not nearly tall enough, blonde enough, or… well okay, you have the belligerent part down, but still. No Bretons."

Mirriam snorted, and nearly knocked her flagon over when foam shot up into her nostrils. "Well that's a relief. The place sounds kind of stupid—there's been absolutely no mention of wenches!" She snuffed and wiped at her nose, trying to get the burning sensation out of it.

"Hmmm… then it looks like you're headed for the Dreamsleeve, pal. It's wretched rebirth for you!"

"Fetch that," Mirriam said, perhaps too loudly. "I'll slaughter this whole town in a drunken stupor if that's what it takes—I'll burn it down right now! I'm not shovin' off unless it's to somewhere better, and by the gods, _I'm takin' you with me!_"

"Well," Thavrin grinned and raised his flagon, and Mirriam did the same, "I think that calls for a self-congratulatory toast."

"Aye," Mirriam barked, and the two blood-brothers stood, ensuring that all of the Bee & Barb patrons were now watching them. "To us, and all the exotic and multifarious ways that we've damned ourselves!"

"To Oblivion with us!" Thavrin smashed his flagon into Mirriam's, ale splashing everywhere.

"Six ways to Sundas, at that! Damned in every faith!"

"_Aye!_" The merry blasphemers, drinking-arms locked in blissfully profane brotherhood, tipped their heads back and guzzled their lukewarm ale. A drunken fisherman applauded them from the corner. Mirriam and Thavrin were oblivious to the glares of the other patrons, and particularly unmindful of the reproachful way that Brother Maramal cleared his throat.

Talen-Jei was nice enough to let them finish their ale before grabbing their collars and dragging them towards the door. "Out! Both of you out! The nerve of you two… why Keerava didn't toss you fetchers out sooner is a testament to her patience."

"Hey! Who you callin' a fetcher?" Mirriam flung her flagon across the room, nearly clipping Marcurio in the ear.

Thavrin took a seemingly less confrontational tone, as always. "You're pretty strong!" And then with an impish grin he added, "_then again so's your mom!_"

Mirriam gave him a sideways glance. "What? How was that an insult? That doesn't even make sense! Being strong's a universally accepted virtue."

"Hey, I tried. Being clever is hard!"

"'Clever?' No way. You are _not_ on top of your game t—"

"_Out!"_ Talen-Jei flung them as far as he could, which admittedly wasn't far at all. Thavrin made sure to tell him as much—or would have if the door hadn't slammed shut on them.

Mirriam helped him up and dusted herself off. "Well, looks like we've just about worn out our welcome. Whaddaya say we go restock our potion stash?"

Thavrin straightened his hood and readjusted a few buckles on his Thieves' Guild armor. "Mirriam, it's nearly midnight."

"I know." She winked and pulled out a lockpick. "We'll just have to keep quiet."

The dark-haired young Bosmer shook his head and followed her down the steps toward the drafty alchemist's shop, taking care not to draw the attention of the guards—an easy enough task, since none of them bothered to patrol the lower levels these days. "Gods… You know that Ingun won't be there, right?"

"Oh, shut up." Mirriam brushed her hair back and got to work on the lock. It was open in less than ten seconds. She eased the heavy wooden door open a crack, peeked inside to make sure the front room was empty, and then crept in with Thavrin not far behind her.

"Seriously, you've worn that Amulet of Mara around her for the past three months," Thavrin whispered. "I hope she didn't notice, 'cause otherwise she's going to think something's wrong with you."

"Shut up," Mirriam whispered back, pulling everything off the shelves and into her knapsack.

"Seriously, she'll think you're damaged goods."

"Your mom's damaged goods."

Thavrin was silent for a second, and then he muttered, "See, I should've worked that into the altercation up top. I think that would've struck home."

"Thavrin, I gave that guy _three flawless amethysts_." Mirriam inspected a cutting of lavender before stuffing it into her pocket. "Don't give him an excuse to get stabbed by us, because then they'd go to waste."

"You don't know. What if he's the Champion of The Rift or something like that?" Thavrin gave Mirriam the signal to wait, snuck around the corner to make sure Elgrim and Halfjorg were still asleep, and then gave her a thumbs-up over the counter. "You just don't know, Mirriam." he was barely audible now as they made their way to the chest where Ingun left her successful potions. "Besides, he's a man in love, and I sort-of-threatened his dame once. Love makes people ridiculously strong, like moms punching bears to save their babies, and other Nord shenanigans."

"Yeah, well madness makes a man strong too, and he'd be crazy to take on the both of us at once." Mirriam rubbed a pinch of horker fat on the hinges of the chest so that they wouldn't creak when she popped it open. "Here, I'm just about at my limit—" Mirriam gasped, clapping her hand over her mouth just in time to stifle it. She and Thavrin froze, waited until Elgrim started snoring again, and then Mirriam lifted a purplish-red bottle out of the chest for Thavrin to see.

His mouth watered. His black eyes grew wide. "By Y'ffre…"

"No shit, Thavrin… Looks like she found out our poison of choice. And look…" Mirriam pulled out a second one, positively radiant with bottled-up joy. "_Two of them!_" She hissed.

"Sap! _Praise the child!_"

Elgrim snorted. Halfjorg turned over and muttered. Mirriam and Thavrin nearly jumped out of their boots.

Five minutes (and one trip to Marise's food stall) later, the two of them were safely outside the city walls and well on their way to the best midnight picnic ever. Then, two frostbite spiders attacked. Mirriam caught a wad of venom right in the face, and as she was wiping it off one of the overgrown arachnids leapt at her, its spiky pink mandibles snapping viciously. "Thavrin!" Mirriam backed away and pulled out her trusty Dawnbreaker, secretly glad she'd relented to that nagging Daedra a week ago. "I could use a little backup!" Her vision was still blurry. She could still see shapes, and she took a swing at the writhing bluish-white one in front of her.

"In a minute, gotta stave this one off!" Thavrin unleashed a poison-tipped arrow from his bow, pulling out another before the first one lodged itself into the carapace between the other, farther-off spider's eyes.

As her vision finally cleared, Mirriam was nearly bowled over by her assailant. She swung her sword down on it, slashing at those oversized fangs. The spider reared up on its four hind legs and, as it came down, found itself impaled on Dawnbreaker and engulfed in flames. Mirriam grabbed it by the head and pulled it further down the blade for good measure. "Never mind, I got it."

"Yeah, same here." Thavrin slung his bow over his shoulder and watched Mirriam wipe the spider guts off of her blade. "You know, it's like everything is getting weaker—or maybe we're getting stronger."

"Don't worry, I'm sure they'll come up with something new to stomp us into the ground. Maybe we should go take on the Aldmeri Dominion all by our lonesome, eh?"

Thavrin rolled his eyes, though it was hard to tell when he did that in any lighting. "Okay, maybe our collective ego will just swell until it suffocates everyone in Tamriel."

"So either way they win?"

"Basically."

Mirriam had harvested the last of the frostbite venom into leftover bottles when Thavrin spotted a familiar caravan of Khajiit. He waved to them and they, mindful of one of their best customers, hailed him in response.

"We thought we smelled blood in the air!" Kharjo shouted.

"Blood and seared slaughterfish!" Thavrin shouted back.

"And pie!" Mirriam added. She ran up and tackled Kharjo, who pulled her into a headlock and laughed. "We have all this food and no one to eat it with!"

Ahkari sniffed at her and her ears perked up. "It seems you have more than food, traveler."

"Yep." Mirriam pulled out her bottle of sleeping tree sap; she was in just enough of a good mood to share. "Do you guys have any tea? I take mine with syrup."

"Don't forget the sweet rolls!" Thavrin held up a sack of foods, both pilfered and honestly acquired. "We have those too, and spiced wine from Solitude—"

Ahkari was salivating by now. "By the Moons… Dro'marash! Get a fire started! We'll take a break here."

The first to go were the pastries. That Khajiit sweet-tooth never failed to amaze Mirriam; she'd always assumed that they'd prefer fish to an apple pie. Thavrin laid claim to all the red apples (never the green ones), his defense being that apples couldn't even grow in Valenwood. "The climate's all wrong, see? So there's no way I'm breaking my people's contract with Y'ffre. If I was, I would've known it long ago."

Mirriam still wasn't allowed to tell Faendal about his apple habit, though. "You know, I can't remember that ever being a problem when we were kids. We ate vegetables like crazy—Mom always made you eat tomatoes, too…"

"Even though she knew I hated them, yeah." Thavrin poured some boiling water into the beat-up metal teapot, tossed in a large pinch of tea leaves, and closed the lid.

Mirriam poured the entire first bottle of sleeping tree sap into everyone else's cups, and ran out just before getting to hers. "Well damn."

"Just open up the second one," Thavrin said.

Mirriam thought about it, and then realized she was pretty tired. This cup would be all she needed that night, and it was almost time to harvest some more from that giant camp anyway; the others could have the rest of the bottle. "Alright." She pulled the cork out with her teeth and lined the bottom of her tankard with a finger of the fragrant sap, and then held the tankard out to Thavrin, who poured some tea over it.

Things did not turn out as planned.

Before she could scoop out the dregs with her finger, Mirriam began to feel funny. She felt like her throat was coated in sealing wax, like it was closing up on her. This wasn't supposed to happen. She looked up at the night sky, and saw that the stars were smeared and dyed purple. This was normal. Her breath seized; it was harder to pull the air in. This wasn't supposed to happen. The grass looked like woven straw, like a green mat. It swam in place before her eyes. This wasn't supposed to happen. She could feel the world rotating, slowly, imperceptible to all except her, hopping back a few paces when it caught her looking. This wasn't supposed to happen.

She didn't notice that the others were watching her until she stood up; Mirriam dusted her pants off, trying to assure them that everything was fine. "I'm going to go lay down now." She took one step, and then fell through the earth.

The descent was slow, and she landed astride the back of a bear. It ran through the trees, ignorant of her presence. She gripped the long hair of its back in her calloused fingers, and she found that the descent to the middle of the forest was smooth. Her hair unbraided itself and flew behind her, floated like she was underwater. She realized that she could still breathe, and that her fingers felt cold and tingly. Behind her she could hear the cries of her friends, the ones she left behind. Thavrin, the traders, Kharjo; Erandur whispered her name with his mouth full of his blood, with his hands over his pierced heart, a heart like a burning ember. She felt its hot rays on her back, but she could not look upon him. Benor's sad eyes burned brightest, and tongues of flame lashed at her neck. Lydia's tortured voice flew forth from charred lungs, and it tore through Mirriam's armor and stabbed her shoulder blades. Mirriam squeezed her eyes shut, but the tears escaped and floated up like bubbles of oil in the water. A small, choked sob tripped out of her mouth.

Branches lashed out at her as they rode down into the valley. The voices of those she left behind grew in number, only to fade as the green sun rose and set in a fuchsia sky. Blue night covered all, covens of fireflies convened in the leaves. The center of the forest drew near; the most ancient tree in the forest came into her vision, soft and serene, its branches filled with light.

From the corner of her eye she saw a bandit in the shadows. He swung his arm and pitched a rock at her head, and before she could dodge it struck her temple. The bear dissolved into a school of river betty and swam away into the thickening night air. Mirriam gasped; boiling water filled her throat, only to evaporate into burning steam as it reached her lungs. She sank down into the soft ground, which billowed up like silt in a riverbed.

Mirriam sat up, clutching the side of her head. A cloud of blood floated from the wound, and she felt dizzy. The water threatened to crush her puny frame at this depth. She looked around for the one who threw the rock, and she heard him laughing, the sound of it echoing through the valley and bouncing off of the walls of her mind. He sat on a boulder, grinning from ear to ear; this was no bandit. It was the night sky in the shape of a man, a man-shaped window to the red and violet cosmos. He drew near, and the night sky faded, gave way to human flesh. He caught the fear in her eyes before she could hide it, and he laughed all the louder. The world itself was benighted, and his eyes were like lamps of burning, alien fury. There was no mirth in that laughter, and those white eyes held no love.

"Well, well, well," he snarled, stooping down to straighten her shirt collar. "It's a small world, isn't it?"

"How—"

The Mad God didn't let her finish. He grabbed her by the shirt and swung her around as if she was a small child, slamming her back against the boulder. Sparks flew from the corners of her vision, and her brain didn't quite know which to process first—the bone-jarring pain of her unprotected skull striking stone, or the sensation of having the wind knocked out of her in the most violent way possible. Her vision blurred, doubled, quadrupled. Only one thing loomed whole and focused in her sight, and it terrified her in a way that her eyes and conscious mind could not decode. She couldn't kick, couldn't use her arms, couldn't even squirm; Mirriam was too busy trying in vain to draw breath while gazing into the white abyss that was Sheogorath's wrathful gaze.

Those blind eyes were ever upon her, unwavering, unblinking. "And you've been so busy, haven't you? Why, we haven't had any time to catch up! I hear your name everywhere I go, too; you must be doing something important, eh? Good on you, my dear!"

His ecstatic tones only made him more terrifying; in the back of her mind, Mirriam knew that his excitement was inversely proportional to how pleased he actually was with her. The Mad God was not in a cheerful mood, and the story of how he'd invented music kept reciting itself in her head. Mirriam opened her mouth, and after a moment she managed to whisper, "what do you want with me?"

Sheogorath laughed, still holding her fast to the face of that stone. "Oh, you cut-up! Always jokin' around, laughin' it up with your little friend, _never realizin' that the rest of the world isn't laughing with you,_" he finished with a bestial growl. It was at this time that Mirriam realized that he had some nice fangs, clean and neat and ready to make tearing her soft throat out that much easier. "Tell me, do you think you can outrun fate? Mmm?" His mouth twitched, and his lips curled into a rabid snarl as he slammed her into the stone again. He shouted, "_Do you think you can outrun it when it's written by your enemies?_"

Mirriam was too scared to even wipe his spittle off her face. She prayed to Mara that he wasn't expecting an actual answer from her, because even if she knew what to say, she wasn't sure she'd have the guts to say it.

"Will you keep spittin' in their faces and mockin' them, and expect to get away with it? What drives you, little mortal—is it revenge? Do you hate them for what they did, for what they took from you? _Huh?_" His broad chest heaved with bestial rage, each breath of it exhaled in her face like sour, atomized hatred, and Mirriam had a sneaking suspicion that he wasn't actually talking about her.

She found a tiny splinter of her old nerve, and swallowed before speaking. "I'm not sure what you're getting at." She regretted opening her mouth the moment those words left, and waited for him to rend her limb from limb. In the morning, three new instruments would be presented to a passing stranger…

This punishment never came, though. He stared at her for what might have been a minute, or five minutes, or an hour—whatever it was, it was too long for Mirriam's comfort. Then, he picked up where he'd left off by jerking her away from the boulder, pulling her close until their noses were nearly touching. He smelled like piss and negligence, like homeless men and the desolate places where they died unnoticed. "Is it pure arrogance?" His voice softened a hair. "Is it hubris writ large, defiance crossed over to delusion? What drives you and that Bosmer child? I'm just _dyin'_ to know, _so tell me,_" he growled, "_Before I lose my patience_."

Mirriam closed her eyes, breathed in, and breathed out. She thought for a moment, and then opened her eyes, and gave him the only answer she could think of. "Me and Thavrin just want the world to piss off—the Imperials tried to take our heads, the Stormcloaks hate everyone who's not a Nord, and the Thalmor want to kill everything that's not them!" Sheogorath raised an eyebrow, but she continued. "Well, I can't speak for Thavrin, actually. You'd have to ask him yourself."

"Oh don't worry; I spoke to him long ago." And just like that, Sheogorath was in good spirits once again. His smile was too wide and full of sharp white teeth to be called warm, but Mirriam felt his vice-like grip on her shirt relax slightly, and so she relaxed too. "Nice boy, really. Loyal to a fault, not quite right in the head, but his heart's in the right place, I'm sure." That was one hell of an accusation coming from the Mad God, but she said nothing about it.

"I still don't understand why we're having this talk, though. I mean, didn't you go back to your realm?"

Sheogorath's smile was gone. "I'm _on a business trip,_" he said through clenched teeth. "Got a meetin' with a certain armored jackass. Got islands to feed, y'know—_and I'll feed 'em with his blood when I catch 'im._" Suddenly he flung her away, disgusted by the thought of his quarry. When he pounced on her he was no longer a man but was a sabre cat, its fur black and white and brown like a housecat's, its eyes green and wide. His breath was like fog in the freezing night air as he pinned her to the forest floor. "A lot of folk have their eye on you, but I think I like you best," he said. "Yes, I might just have use for you." He opened his mouth and hissed, white fangs long and gleaming. "All it takes is one bad bottle of sap, _and you're all mine_." His big paws felt lighter on her chest now, and she could breathe normally. The rays of the two moons swam through his body like he was running water. "I need you intact though. What a shame. _Now wake up, girl!_"

"Wake up! Mirriam!" Someone was shaking her. Mirriam started, and when she blinked Thavrin was crouched over her, casting a healing spell. "Gods, what am I going to do with you?" The Khajiit caravanners stood around him, watching her with a mixture of concern, amusement, and mild embarrassment.

"Thavrin…" Mirriam's mouth felt dry, like it was full of cotton, and there was a sour taste in it. The healing spell took away her pain, but her neck felt very stiff. "What happened? How long was I gone?"

"'Gone?' Mirriam, you didn't leave. You just fell down this hill and threw up on a tree." What Thavrin pointed to was more of a cliff than a hill in Mirriam's opinion, but she let him continue. "Oh, and you tried to roll back uphill. That happened."

"What?"

"Yeah." Thavrin scratched his head and then helped Mirriam onto her feet. "You probably shouldn't sleep outdoors tonight, or ever, and frankly I think you owe that tree an apology."

"But you guys didn't see another man here? Or a calico sabre cat?"

Ahkari narrowed her eyes. The other Khajiit exchanged nervous glances. "There are no calico sabre cats in this land or any other, traveler."

"But I just saw one. He had green eyes, big fangs, and weird fur. He was a man first, and then…" Mirriam stopped when she realized how stupid she sounded. "Never mind. Thavrin, let's find somewhere a little flatter to sleep. Think they'll take us in down by Shor's Stone? Or maybe we should go back to Riften. What do you think?"

Thavrin's answer never came. He was too busy watching the Khajiit scurry away as fast as they could without actually running.

###


	2. New Dawn Fades

_**New Dawn Fades**_

_In the earliest of days, in a time when the world was still raw, Sheogorath decided to walk amongst the mortals. He donned his guise of Gentleman With a Cane, and moved from place to place without being recognized. After eleven days and eleven nights, Sheogorath decided that life among mortals was even more boring than his otherworldly existence._

_'What can I do to make their lives more interesting?' he said to himself. At that same moment, a young woman nearby commented wistfully to herself, 'The sounds of the birds are so beautiful.'_

_Sheogorath silently agreed with her. Mortals could not make the beautiful and inspired calls of birds. Their voices were wretched and mundane. He could not change the nature of mortals, for that was the purview of other Daedric Princes. However, he could give them tools to make beautiful sounds._

_Sheogorath took hold of the petulant woman and ripped her asunder. From her tendons he made lutes. From her skull and arm bones he made a drum. From her bones he made flutes. He presented these gifts to the mortals, and thus Music was born._

Mymophonus, _Myths of Sheogorath_

* * *

It was more difficult to part ways the next morning than they'd anticipated, especially after last night's incident. Mirriam rubbed some ointment into her stiff neck and shoulders while Thavrin fixed them a pot of venison stew over the cooking fire. The miners were up before them, and had already gone down into the mines by the time they were able to rouse themselves from their bedrolls. The constant pounding of Filnjar's hammer against the workbench rang sharply through the little hollow, and it did nothing to help Mirriam and Thavrin's throbbing headaches.

"Here we go—one nice, big bowl of stew for the nimblest warrior!" Thavrin set the bowl on her lap with a grin and sat down next to her.

"Shut up," Mirriam grumbled. "It was just a bad bottle; something got into it, or maybe Ingun's trying to poison me." The thought made her miserable, and not just because she had to collect sixty herb samples for the woman. In fact, that had been a pleasure if anything. "What'd I ever do to her?"

"Who knows? Eat your stew before it gets cold." Thavrin had already gulped down most of his stew, and was scooping the leftover venison and vegetables out with a heel of last night's bread.

Mirriam stared down at her bowl, lost in thought. What had she done to anger her friend? That is, if she could even be called such. It was true that Ingun was usually detached and disinterested in anyone who wasn't her test subject, but would she really poison someone who'd proven to be such a valuable resource? Maybe she had other idiots who were willing to bring her nirnroot from the four corners of Skyrim; the thought saddened Mirriam more than she wanted to admit.

Suddenly there was a hand in front of her face, and it snapped its fingers under her nose. Mirriam jumped, nearly spilling the stew.

"Mirriam!" Thavrin leaned over and snapped again. "Don't daydream; you have things to do, too! You won't be in Whiterun until midnight at the rate you're going."

"Do you think she poisoned me?"

Thavrin shook his head and sighed. "Mirriam, if I were you I'd be more worried about the hallucination than Ingun. But if you're that concerned, why don't you just talk to her before you leave? Here," Thavrin dug around in his knapsack and produced a jar of white powder and a tiny box containing several small pearls. "I think these'll help—give them to her. They're pretty tough to come by, even if your family's rich and ridiculously powerful. At the very least she'll feel like an ass for trying to poison you. Assuming that's what she did, anyway. Just make sure you butter her up _before_ trying to find out if she made an attempt on your life. I shouldn't even have to say that, really."

Mirriam took the pearls out of their box and examined them in the light. They had a bluish tint, like the icebergs at sea when the sun struck them at just the right angle on a clear day. Their surfaces were nearly flawless, with gentle ripples that shone in the light. "How did you even get these? They're beautiful."

"I was hanging on to them until I could think of a good use for them. Now c'mon, eat your stew already!" Thavrin stood and shrugged his knapsack onto his shoulders. He picked up a discarded tankard and examined himself in its glass bottom, straightening his hood and making sure his long beard was clean and tied up properly. "How do I look? Maybe I should wear the Nightingale armor instead…"

"You look stunning, like always. I'm sure she'll like you just as much as she did last time she saw you. And don't wear the Nightingale armor—I don't think the hood is going to do you any favors."

"Are you sure she likes me?"

"Of course not; I'm no mind-reader. I do have a good feeling about it, though. Just let her know how sweet and brave you are, or talk about your sniping or something. Don't freak out or vomit on her and you'll do fine."

"Right…" Thavrin grimaced and took a deep breath. "So off I go."

"Alright. Have fun in Racist City."

"Yeah, and have fun never being able to smooch Ingun."

"S-shut up!" Mirriam scowled down at the lukewarm bowl of stew on her lap. After Thavrin took a few steps down the path she looked up and called after him. "Thavrin!"

Thavrin stopped and looked over his shoulder at her. "Hmm?"

Mirriam ran up and threw her arms around him, burying her face in his shoulder. "Don't die, okay?" She mumbled.

He put his arms around her in a warm embrace. "Don't worry, sis. I'll meet you in Solitude when this is all over." Mirriam nodded, and he held her out at arm's length and gave her an encouraging smile. "Now go kick arse and take names."

"Alright, you too!" Mirriam took a step back and watched him leave. Then she ate as much of the cold stew as she could stomach (which wasn't much) and walked back to Riften to have a chat with Ingun.

The short walk was uneventful and weird in turns. The Khajiit had packed up early, perhaps in the hope of not having to talk to her; she passed them by on the road, and only Kharjo was able to look her in the eye. A dragon had descended upon the Riften stables, but the horses and the guards proved strongest, and killed it before Mirriam decided whether to shock it or burn it. She shrugged and walked up to scavenge whatever she could off of the thing, and absorbed its soul in the process. This delighted everyone to no end, like always, and Mirriam did her best to hide how pleased she felt by the slack-jawed wonder of the town guards. Not that it mattered. They'd be back to talking down to her and threatening to lock her up next time she saw them, and she wouldn't have it any other way—it was far more satisfying to hear the idle threats of the guards, who couldn't catch her in the act of lock-picking if she'd worn a sign on her back. It took a long time to get that good, and damned if she wasn't going to enjoy the fruits of her labor.

Inside the city, everything was normal; as usual, the people within the city walls had no idea that a dragon had been at the gates. Mirriam stopped by the open market to give Marise a few ice wraith teeth that she'd stolen off of Elgrim the night before. If Marise knew that she and Thavrin had been the ones who'd raided her stall the night before, it didn't show; Mirriam felt a twinge of guilt when the Dunmer lady insisted that she take a slab of venison wrapped in paper as a token of thanks. "I know how much you and Thavrin love venison, so don't argue with me. I even seasoned it for you!" It smelled delicious, having been rubbed with dried elves ear, garlic, salt, and juniper.

"Thanks, ma'am…" Mirriam blushed and scurried down into the canal before she could give herself away, and stowed the meat in her knapsack. At the door of the alchemist's shop, she straightened her tunic and apron, decided against wearing her Amulet of Mara, and checked to see if her breath smelled. "Right… let's do this," she said to herself, and then she pushed the door open.

Inside, the longsuffering Halfjorg stood at the counter while Elgrim tooled around in the back of the shop, complaining loudly about last night's burglary. Somehow, Mirriam was less conflicted about this particular job than she was about knocking over Marise's stall. Ingun was as calm as always, seated by the fire with her nose in a book.

Mirriam watched her for a moment, smiling sadly, and then sat down next to her. "'Morning, Miss Ingun."

Ingun looked up at her with a knowing smile and placed the book on her lap. "Oh—good morning. Have you restocked your potion supply yet?"

"I did, and I can't wait to use that frenzy poison. Thank you." Mirriam knew that she knew, and Mirriam also knew that she couldn't care less.

That detachment from the world, and from the commonly-held beliefs of her contemporaries, had always been a major selling-point to Mirriam, a compliment to the young Black-Briar's cold beauty. Sure, it didn't necessarily make someone into a marriageable partner, but there was something clean and honest about it; better to reflect and reject common beliefs than to live like the people who'd never thought about _why_ they believed what they believed. Either that or she just liked bad people.

Mirriam cleared her throat, took the powdered mammoth tusk and the box of pearls out of her pocket, and handed them to Ingun. "Here," she said, "I thought you might like these for your experiments." When she saw the rare expression of surprise on Ingun's face she added, "They're kinda hard to come by, but I don't have much use for them. Thavrin's the alchemist, not me." She pressed them into Ingun's hands with a smile, and sat back to watch as Ingun admired the pearls in the firelight.

"Gods…" Ingun whispered. "These are nearly impossible to find! How did you—"

"I have my sources." Mirriam couldn't repress her smile as Ingun took her rough hand in hers and squeezed it gently; she made a mental note to buy Thavrin a whole sack of red apples.

"Well thank you, Mirriam. I really don't know what to say." Ingun gently folded the items into a piece of cloth and tucked it into her pocket.

Mirriam watched her, saw no hint of remorse in her face, and wondered if Ingun was capable of feeling such a thing. Then, in the most casual way she could manage, she asked quietly, "Say, did you happen to leave a couple bottles of sap in the chest last night?"

Ingun looked up at her and frowned. "I never touch the stuff. A clouded mind is worthless. Did you find some in there?"

"Yeah. Maybe—" Mirriam lowered her voice again and leaned closer to Ingun, "maybe Elgrim stashed it in there?"

"Oh no, he hates things like that. He won't even buy or sell moon sugar without turning around and giving me a stern lecture on the dangers of skooma. It's very tiresome, really."

"Ugh. Sounds like it."

"So you say that there was a bottle of sap in there…"

"Two, actually. One of them was tainted, too."

Ingun tilted her head, intrigued. "Tainted? How so?"

"Uhh…" Mirriam decided not to go into detail. "Well, it was way stronger than usual. Sap doesn't make people hallucinate, or make their throat close up."

"Asphyxiation, interesting… I wonder if my grandmother is after you. It would be a shame, since you'd have to skip town forever or die."

"Y—you think so? It'd be a shame?"

Ingun looked up from her lap and studied Mirriam. Her voice was a little less cool when she spoke. "You're not wearing your amulet. I was wondering when you'd give up."

This caught Mirriam by surprise. "I…" Mirriam let her words die unspoken; what could she say? What _should_ she say? She nearly leapt out of her seat when Ingun placed her soft, pale hand on her knee; she thought she was imagining again when she saw that tiny hint of regret on Ingun's face—or maybe she was just imagining it.

"Mirriam, believe me when I tell you that you'd rather I poison you now than bring you into my family. You and Sibbi would murder each other, and I can't say that any of my relatives would be pleased for me to settle down with a woman, and knowing you," she added with a wry smile, "you'd get bored and run off with Maul one night. At any rate, I'm married to my work; my passion lies in alchemy and alchemy alone. I'll be here if you need an elixir, but beyond that I can provide you with nothing else." Ingun rose from her seat, hesitated, and then she leaned down and placed a light, chaste kiss upon Mirriam's brow.

Mirriam sighed and looked up into those pale eyes. "I can't say I didn't expect that, but thank you all the same. For the honesty, I mean. That's what I've always liked about you."

"You'll find someone—there are always others." Ingun set the book down on her chair. "Thank you for the reagents. I'm sure I can put them to good use. And I hope that you find out what happened—tainted potions can be deadly. For what it's worth, I'm glad that you survived." And with that, she walked into the back of the shop to speak with Elgrim, who'd worn himself out finally from all of his useless grousing.

Mirriam, meanwhile, had a lot to think about, and much to her relief it had nothing to do with the pain of rejection. She bought a few healing and magicka potions from Halfjorg and left the store. One more stop in Riften—the Temple of Mara.

She made her usual donation and sat in the back for a while, watching as Dinya performed her rites and as Briehl swept the floor. Briehl looked up at her and waved; Mirriam turned her gaze to the floor when their eyes met, and didn't look up again until it was time to leave.

Outside the gates of the city, her horse stood in one of the stalls, flicking its tail as it calmly watched her. She walked past, knowing that it would follow her anyway, or that it would patiently wait for her there at the stables. She tried not to think of the last time she'd ridden anywhere on Frost, that trip to a small port city up north that she hadn't returned to since. Instead, she turned her thoughts in a more practical direction—or if not practical, then at least relevant to her current predicament.

In light of who was in her vision last night, she felt a little foolish for worrying so much about a simple crush. _Yeah, it was only a crush. I knew all along that nothing would come of it—a fling at most, but that's all…_ It hadn't been the first time that she'd spoken directly to a Daedric Prince, and it hadn't even been the first time she'd spoken to Sheogorath. He was in Solitude about two or three months back, enjoying some harebrained holiday with a dead (or not-dead) tyrant. He was friendly enough then, and not the least bit violent. In fact, the whole situation had been almost as enjoyable as her and Thavrin's drinking-binge-turned-scavenger-hunt with Sanguine. Sure, there hadn't been nearly as much booze, and she ended up having to fight off a dragon priest with a magical stick, but even that stick had been nothing but a boon so far. The Wabbajack produced a wealth of coins and (admittedly stale) sweetrolls when it wasn't blowing things up, or mutating them in the most entertaining ways possible—and that far outweighed the occasional, accidental summoning of unfriendly Dremora that it sometimes caused.

The Sheogorath that she'd encountered last night, however, seemed a lot more unhinged than the one in Solitude. Just how sane could the Mad God be, though? Maybe he'd been faking civility in the Blue Palace, or wherever they'd really been. Something about last night was beyond unhinged, though. Now that she thought back on his words, the look on his face, his posturing; he'd been crazy, alright, but it was a cornered-animal kind of crazy. All of this was to say nothing of how frequently he was portrayed as clear-headed and in-control in all of the books she'd read. The clarity and focus of the Mad God when contending with the other Princes was almost more frightening than his insanity. Of course, this could have been a product of poor writing, but she had no way to be sure.

In the end, Mirriam decided that she shouldn't be so surprised at his mood swings. "But he could've been a little gentler," she mumbled, to no one in particular. Her back still hurt from last night's fall, but she couldn't be sure if all of the pain and stiff muscles could be pinned on a tumble down a hill. Her headache hadn't gone down much, either. She stopped next to a crumbling wall that ran along the path to Whiterun and fished a vial of skooma out of her pocket. It really was difficult to get the good stuff in Skyrim—here it was watery and provided very little kick for all the side effects. Mirriam stared at the black vial for a minute and pocketed it again, deciding that an hour of relief wasn't worth an entire day of the jitters and insatiable cotton-mouth. "Can't even get hooked to this crap. Why is this even illegal here?"

Mirriam felt a twinge of self-consciousness, and looked around her. Sure enough, an Orc was standing nearby, listening to her talk to herself.

"Oh…" she cleared her throat and looked away, and then looked back at him to see if he was still watching her. Indeed, he was eyeing her with some measure of concern. "Uhh, hey."

"Hey."

"You waitin' around for someone?"

"I am waiting for an honorable death. I have reached an age where I have nothing left to contribute to this world, and I wish to depart before I shame myself."

"So you're a twenty-something too, huh?"

He blinked and looked at her in surprise. "You understand me, then!"

"I was just being sarcastic, actually…" she muttered under her breath, though she had to admit that the idea had presented itself to her more than once—usually when she'd gone more than twelve hours without inflicting violence on something. Mirriam cleared her throat, and said in a louder voice, "Okay, so what if I decide to help you with that?"

"You would be willing to do this for me?"

"Sure. I like to think I'm a worthy opponent." Mirriam unsheathed Dawnbreaker and readied her flame cloak spell. "Think you can take on a spellsword?"

The Orc's expression brightened considerably at the mention of a challenge. "We'll find out soon enough!" He had his warhammer out in a heartbeat, and it sailed straight for Mirriam's head.

Mirriam decided she'd had enough with head injuries for one day though, and dodged. He swung again, and his warhammer was met with the shining blade of Dawnbreaker. Sparks flew, and Mirriam's arm nearly went numb from the impact. She jumped back and invoked her flame cloak… which did nothing to discourage the Orc from lunging at her.

Mirriam grunted and barely staved off another attempt at her skull. _Oh yeah… He's suicidal, I forgot about that._ Mirriam blocked and then thrust her sword at his belly. The blade sank into his hide armor and cut deep, but one wound wasn't enough to fell an Orc of his skill and strength. He roared and took a swing at Mirriam, and this time he nearly knocked the woman off her feet.

Mirriam staggered back, clutching her side. Her ribcage was still tender from last night, and all she wanted was to curl up on the ground and cry at that moment. She didn't, of course—something about having an irate Orc bearing down on her kept her motivated and awake. Mirriam ducked and slashed, striking his right side as she dove under his arm and avoided an attack that might have finished her. She cast a quick healing spell and spun around in time to see the warhammer swinging around to meet her face. She put up Dawnbreaker and blocked with the flat of the blade, and it was all she could do to keep the sword from flying out of her hand.

Mirriam took a deep breath and shouted, "_FUS-RO-DAH!_"

The Orc flew backward like a piece of paper in a gust of wind. He was unable to keep his warhammer from flying out of his hand; he frantically grasped at the earth as he bounced off of it and staggered to a halt on the edge of a precipice, inches from a meeting with the rocks and swiftly-flowing river below it.

Mirriam knew it was unfair, but what choice did she have? Damned if she was going to die for the sake of some idiot's pride. She reached into a pouch at her belt, grabbed a bottle of one of Ingun's many poisons, and tore the cork out with her teeth. She drenched her blade in the stuff as she sprinted toward the Orc, who was just regaining his feet. She crouched, seized him by the hair, and thrust her blade up under his ribs and into his chest, really putting her back into it this time. The powerful toxins did him in before Dawnbreaker's flames could touch him.

The expression on his face was one of shock, confusion, and blind fury: the look of a man who'd been screwed. Mirriam pulled her blade out and kicked him over the edge. "It's as good a death as you can ask for," she said as she watched his broken body tumble down into the ravine, "You thought you stood a chance against me?" She cleaned her sword on the hem of her tunic and sheathed it and stood at the edge, watching his body float away in the river. "Don't expect any pity," she shouted after him, "you asked for this!" Her pulse slowed down to its normal speed after a minute, and the feeling of triumph leeched away with the adrenaline, leaving her feeling more tired and crummy than before, and now with a sticky film of some stranger's blood on her hands, to boot. "Shit…"

Mirriam loped down the path until she reached a gentler riverbank, one that didn't put her in too much danger of breaking something or getting swept downstream. There was no sign of the body—either the mudcrabs had gotten to it, or it had washed up on the shore somewhere further up. It was an hour or two past noon, by Mirriam's reckoning, and the still air was humid and unseasonably hot. The spray of river water splashing against the rocks was her only relief from the heat. Mirriam undid her hair, waded into the water up to her calves and got on her hands and knees. She held her breath and let the cold water and smooth, green water-weeds flow around her face and through her unbraided brown hair until she couldn't hold her breath anymore, then she pulled her head up and took a handful of water to her cracked lips. It was barely enough to be called a sip, so she leaned down again to lap up the water like an animal when she heard singing—loud and deep and a little too affected, in her opinion.

She glanced around her and spotted the source of the noise; he was standing on the far shore, hands clasped against his diaphragm as he belted out a melodramatic tune in a language she'd never heard before. "_Du liebes Kind, komm, geh mit mir! Gar schöne Spiele spiel' ich mit dir; Manch' bunte Blumen sind an dem Strand, Meine Mutter hat manch gülden Gewand..._"

"Son of a s'wit," she growled.

The Mad God stopped singing at once, and he smiled and waved excitedly at her. Without a hint of reservation he splashed into the river and crossed over to her side. "Mirriam, m'girl! Remember me?"

Mirriam stood and squeezed her eyes shut, then shook her head like a dog trying to dislodge a stubborn flea. When she opened them, he was still right there in front of her, smiling in a wide and disarming way, as friendly and engaging as a little child. Mirriam knew better than to fall for the facade, however, and was having none of it. She took a step back, nearly slipped on a wet rock, turned around and tried to run to the shore.

"_Oh no you don't!_" He shouted, "C'mere ya little rascal!" He grabbed the back of her shirt collar and yanked her back toward him, and much to her dismay he picked her up off her feet in an awkward, rib-cracking hug from behind. "It's been far too long since we had our chat! Don'tcha miss me, little girl?"

The heat of the sun beating down on her half-shorn scalp, the ache of her battered and exhausted body, the throbbing of her headache—all of it became too much for her when that beggar's stench rolled up and hit her nostrils. She'd murdered lesser men without remorse under such circumstances, and in her condition she was beyond the ability to exchange pleasantries. "No! I _do not_ miss you, you dirty-fetchin' weirdo! _Get off me!_" Mirriam squirmed her way out of his arms and fell onto her backside in the freezing-cold water, much to Sheogorath's amusement and her consternation. She stood and whirled around to face the Daedric Prince, her face red with pent-up rage and humiliation. Her hair whirled around with her and plastered itself to the side of her face with a wet slapping noise, adding to Mirriam's growing frustration. She growled and scraped her wet hair off of her face, glaring up at Sheogorath the whole time, wishing that he would just smite her already and end her misery.

He simply laughed at her, though. "Well now, we're a lot braver when the sun's up, aren't we? Or maybe it's because we have our wits about us, aye?" His fulgent grin became slightly menacing, and there was a playful glint in his pale eyes as he added through gritted teeth, "Yes, sobriety does that sometimes."

Mirriam glared at him for a second, uncomprehending at first, and then gasped loudly. "You're the one who put those bottles of sap in there—_it was all you!_"

"Ohh, you're a quick one, y' are!" Sheogorath patted her cheek, not bothering to mask his condescension, and watched her seethe helplessly for a moment before continuing. "Now, don't you want to know why I'm here? Aren't you _the least bit curious_ as to why I'm standing here havin' this conversation with you, an insignificant little—"

Mirriam cut him off through gritted teeth, "Does it have to do with 'a certain armored jackass'? Well get in line, 'cause damn if I don't already have all these people begging me to do their wetwork for them!" He was not cooperating with her very obvious death-wish, and he was speaking far too loudly for her aching head to tolerate much longer.

His eyebrows shot up, and he daintily placed a hand over his mouth in mock-surprise. "What's this? You were listening? Wonderful! Now I can get straight to the fun part!" The Mad God slung his arm around her shoulder and reeled her back in, as if he was imparting some juicy secret that the mudcrabs might overhear, and he whispered, "And believe me, little girl, _there_ _is always a fun part._" He howled with laughter and slapped Mirriam's back, sending her back down into the water.

Mirriam groaned in pain and stood shakily, and picked the gravel out of her sore knees. "What's the fun part?" She asked with a weary sigh.

"Oh, now don't say it like that! You make everything sound so… so…" He was distracted by something upstream—a small mudcrab was nestling itself into the cool silt for a little nap. "Are ya hungry?"

"What?"

The Mad God charged through the water, hoisted the startled crab above his head, and smashed it into a large rock over and over until long after it had stopped moving. "Ha—just like an otter! Do y' like otters? Cute little fellows, aren't they?" He brought the dead mudcrab back over to where Mirriam was standing and tore off a leg, handing it to her in what was probably the weirdest act of goodwill she'd ever witnessed, assuming that's what it was. "Here—all the good meat's inside their claws, though. Hope ye don't mind…" That being said, he noisily proceeded to bite his way through the claws to the soft white meat inside them.

Mirriam held the severed mudcrab appendage in her hand and watched him. She felt like she was going to be sick, and she was pretty sure she had no idea what an otter was supposed to be.

"Mmmm… the key's to smash 'em while they're still young. Let 'em get too big, and all that meat starts to taste dull."

"What?"

Sheogorath licked his lips and threw the mangled carcass over his shoulder, and wiped his mouth on his sleeve. "You heard me—get _'em while they're young._ Before they're set in their ways. It's fun enough to rip 'em apart when they're old and frail, one shell at a time, but oh, when the seeds of discord are planted early! When they take that madness for themselves, twisting the roots in the rocky soil of their lives, giving it their own, unique flavor—_that is some of the choicest reaping if you ask me._ I'm not like those other Princes, always tryin'a lead everyone about by the nose, like some overbearing father. I _like_ you guys, just the way you are. Minus that whole 'sanity' thing, of course."

Mirriam stared at him, brows furrowed. "What does this have to do with mudcrabs, or that job you have for me?"

"_Absolutely nothing!_" He crowed. "Are ye gonna finish that?" He pointed to the crab leg in her hand.

"Uhh, no—no, you can—"

He snatched it out of her hand and gnawed on it, cracking the tough carapace with his sharp teeth and loudly sucking the meat and juices out.

Mirriam closed her eyes, but the noises couldn't be blocked out by eyelids. "So… what were you saying before lunch happened?"

"Oh Mirriam, do ye' expect me to summarize everythin' for you? When are you going to learn to read between the lines? You'll be of no use if you don't dust off that tiny brain of yours and _use it_ once in a while! Expand your mind! What use are all those drugs _if y'don't open up yer third eye?_" He laughed and jabbed her forehead painfully with one greasy finger, as if there was an actual eye there for him to poke.

"Ow! This conversation's what's shutting my brain down. Now get to the point, old man!" Mirriam covered her brow with both hands and glared at him.

"Fine, fine, what a spoilsport you are! I thought you'd want a little warning … Anyway, I forgot to tell you last night that I want your help with something." He tossed the remnants of the mudcrab's severed leg into the water and licked his fingers clean. "See, there's a war being fought in your world right now, and not one of those meaningless political slappy-fights you mortals like to get into."

The same could have been said about one of several things she'd been asked to deal with in the past five months of her life. Mirriam closed her eyes and silently counted to ten, opened her eyes again, and said, "Who's fighting in this war, then?"

"Me and my worst enemy, of course! Why else would I care?"

Hell if Mirriam should know—Daedric Princes cared about the damndest things. She sighed and gave up on him ever smiting her, and waited for the part where he'd make ridiculous demands, maybe something involving a fork and a live farm animal…

"Now, I'm doing well enough for myself. I've got him runnin' scared—he won't even face me in combat! Problem is, my followers ain't farin' so well."

"Yeah?"

"It's true. They're loveable enough in their own right, but I'm ashamed to say they aren't very easy to command sometimes, especially when you're not standin' right there in front of them. A bit like herdin' cats, in fact." He paused and stroked his beard as he remembered something. "I tried that once, y'know. Those little kittens weren't too enthusiastic about it; they escaped the holdin' pen and mauled poor Haskill. He's such a good sport," he said fondly, letting his mind wander for a brief moment. "Now where was I? Oh yes—my people… You know a bit about managin' people, don'tcha?"

"Uhh, no? I've never managed anyone in my life!" Mirriam held her hands up and backed away a step, wanting very much to be out of that river and away from the Mad God. He'd figured out the perfect way to punish her insolence without actually killing her: existing and talking loudly.

He took a step toward her and put his arm around her shoulder again. "Oh sure you do," he said in a reassuring tone, "you just don't realize it! And you've plenty of experience emancipatin' 'em, too! Like that poor Hemming fellow!"

"Wh—were you—?" Mirriam stopped and sighed loudly. Of course he'd been watching her; when they weren't making everyone else clean up their messes for them, the Princes seemed to spend a lot of time watching mortals. "Look—that was _one job,_ okay? Mostly I just kill people, so point me in the right direction and I'll hit your enemies with a pointy stick, like I just did to that guy." Mirriam jerked her thumb at the dead Orc from earlier; whatever knocked it loose and sent it downstream had crack timing.

Sheogorath stamped his foot petulantly, splashing the both of them and kicking up more sediment. "But I don't _want_ you to hit him with a pointy stick—_I'm_ gonna smite him! _Me!_"

"Then have me hit _someone else_ with a pointy stick!" Mirriam stamped her foot too, partly for emphasis and partly for the sake of mocking him.

"_NO! That comes LATER!_" Sheogorath was shouting now, his face reddening. The sky seemed to darken above them, but that only encouraged her.

"_Then what in Oblivion do you want?_" Mirriam stood on her tip-toes and shrieked right back in his face. She had him now…

Sheogorath grabbed her by the shirt and yanked her off the ground. "_Right now I wanna wring your scrawny little_—ooh, that was smooth. Very clever, little girl. Nice try." Like the throwing open of a curtain in a dark room, the Mad God's anger dissipated. He smiled pleasantly as he calmly dropped Mirriam back into the water. "Sorry, but no death yet. Not while he stalks the mortal world, harrassin' my helpless supplicants! But don't worry," he added as he stooped down next to her. "A day will come when I'll snatch that still-beating heart right out'cher chest." He placed one thick finger on her breastplate, right above her heart. Mirriam instinctively followed his finger with her eyes, and when she looked down he flicked her nose roughly.

"Ow!" Mirriam stumbled to her feet, holding her nose.

Sheogorath stood back up, his grin widening at the promise of carnage. "Yes… not today, but soon enough. We'll see how you're feelin' on that day, m'girl. Now, I need you to go meet a mutual friend of ours on your way to Solitude. He'll be helpin' you round up my dear children while I run a few errands, and _you'll_ help him lead my army to victory on Mt. Kilkreath."

"You want me to go to Solitude?" _And you have an army?_

"Oh yes, I do love that city—plenty of nice folk, and plenty of nasty ones, too. They strike just the right balance up there if y' ask me."

"Wait, are you kidding?"

Sheogorath clutched his cravat and gasped, as if he'd been morally offended. "I _never_ kid about anything, _ever!_"

_Yeah right_. "You mean I should just keep doing what I'm doing, and it'll all magically fall into place? _This_ is the big conclusion—the whole reason you decided to drop by? No schedule-crippling detours or anything? No remote mountain-top ruins? Not even a concrete deadline? _Are you serious?_" Mirriam was shouting by now; her voice echoed through the ravine, startling a rabbit on the far shore. This whole conversation had been a waste of time that she'd never get back, time that could have been spent buried under a mountain of blankets and pelts, surrounded by bottles of mead and wine; all that potential wasted in the company of her new least-favorite person…

He scratched his chin and squinted, thinking about it. "Mmm, well, I don't about it happening 'magically,' but yes. These things do have a way of making themselves happen—trust me."

Mirriam studied him, her brow deeply furrowed from all the pain and the confusion and the irritation. "_What in Oblivion have you done to Solitude?_" She growled.

This was met with gales of hearty laughter from the Mad God, and another slap on the back. "Oh, you slay me! 'What have I done to Solitude,' she says… _HA!_ What a pity I need you in one piece right now… such a waste of potential!" He tousled her hair and winked, like the friendly and charming uncle that she'd never wanted. "You take care now, girl—don't do anything I wouldn't do!"

_Like bathe?_ She thought.

"We'll see each other again soon enough, don't you worry, but now I gotta see about flushin' out that yellow-bellied sack o'—"

"Wait, who is it, anyway? Who's this enemy of yours?"

"Nobody you'd know about, girl, and frankly I'd like to keep it that way." His expression became grave, but then the moment passed on, as light and transient as a small cloud. "Next time I see you I'll expect a full report, and it'd better be nothing but good news. Ooh—and some juicy gossip! Make somethin' up if you have to!" Having concluded, the Mad God ran down the bank to where an elk was taking a drink from the shallows, leaped onto its back with more finesse than any blind person should rightfully have, and rode the poor, startled creature out of the ravine and to gods knew where. His insane laughter echoed off of the cliffs, and rang inside Mirriam's sore head.

#

Thavrin held up a hand and smiled. "No payment is necessary, child. This one was on the house."

"Oh no, I insist! This is a family heirloom, and it'll fetch you a nice price!" The little boy looked much worse than he had when Thavrin first visited two or three days ago—greasy, disheveled hair, dark circles under his eyes, wrinkled clothes, bloodstains on his sleeves and knees. Aventus's eyes were glassy and wide with unhealthy enthusiasm.

"Thank you, but trust me when I say that her absence from this world is all the payment I need. She was a discredit to every guardian and caretaker in Tamriel. I was an orphan once, you know—just like you."

"You were? Did you see them die? _Did you see your parents die?_"

Thavrin nodded. "I did. And then I slit their killers' throats. I was about your age when it happened, now that I think of it."

"Really? Do you think _I_ could do something like that?" The boy could barely keep still, and his enthusiasm would have been unnerving to most people.

"You might," he said. "Then again, maybe not. Could be you're just getting worked up about something you can't handle. One never can tell until the knife is in their hand and the enemy is at their door." He winked and tucked the silver plate into his bag, and then ruffled the boy's hair. "Just don't go looking for trouble, or you'll end up like old Calixto. He forgot the most important rule of all."

"What's that?"

"There's always someone tougher than you, someone smarter than you. There's no changing that, kid, but if you stay sharp, you just might spot them coming in time to get out of the way."

Aventus hadn't blinked for nearly a minute. He was enraptured by his new hero, and Thavrin couldn't deny that he enjoyed the admiration. "I'll remember, don't you worry!"

"Smart kid." He paused and glanced at the chunk of human flesh in the next room. It hadn't quite started to turn yet, thanks to the dry, freezing-cold air, and Thavrin hadn't eaten since that morning. "Say, you don't need that meat anymore, do you?"

Thavrin ate his meal on the front stoop of the Arentino house, unmindful of the suspicious stares of passing guards. Barely anyone used that street and few, if any, people knew human flesh by sight alone. At least, outside of Markarth. The flesh was energizing in ways that regular food wasn't, all thanks to that ring on his finger. Thavrin examined it in the pale light of the cloudy afternoon; he didn't like thinking about that night, when he took his first step down a road he shouldn't have explored. That priest had done no harm to him, and he wasn't family. Thavrin had felt sick when he'd eaten of the man's flesh, when wretched Namira gloated over his debasement of his people's ways, and when the others reveled in their perversion. He couldn't help wondering why he'd gone through with it. It was a mockery of the holy funerary rites, and Thavrin could only think of one way to atone for his transgression.

Erandur was right.

Thavrin shook his head, as if to shake loose the thoughts like raindrops from leaves. He pulled a red apple out of his satchel and bit into it, closed his eyes and savored the sweetness of its white, bloodless meat. He licked the juice off of his lips, wiped his mouth with the back of his hand, and washed the bite of apple down with a swig of mead.

Once he'd finished his lunch, Thavrin checked his reflection in the panes of a nearby window, straightened his green tunic and vest, and threw back his dark mage's hood so that his silky black hair was visible. He gave himself a winning smile and headed down the narrow street towards the market.

Niranye was at her stall, enjoying a brief moment to herself between the clusters of prospective customers and sellers that wandered around the area. Thavrin approached and cleared his throat. "Uhh, good afternoon. How's business?" He suppressed a grimace—not the most impressive way to open a conversation, but it was too late for him to regroup.

If Niranye was aware of how stupid he sounded at that moment, she did a good job of hiding it. "Hello, Thavrin. What can I interest you in today?"

"Well… uhh…" he lowered his head and sighed. This was already so far removed from the scenario he had planned, and he wondered if he'd have anything to brag about to his sister when he got to Solitude. "I could use more arrows. What do you have?" He offered up a shy smile—not too shy, though. No need to wear his youth and relative inexperience on his sleeve.

It had the desired effect. Her professional demeanor started to crack; he knew what people looked like when they were trying to hide their emotions. "I received a shipment just yesterday. In fact, I'd ordered some ebony arrows with you in mind. Here," she pulled the quiver-full out from behind the counter and offered them up for inspection. "Is there anything else you were interested in?"

Did she know? Was this to be taken as encouragement? Thavrin considered this for a second, ran his finger across the old cut on his lip, wished for a moment that he'd opted to keep his hood up, and decided not to bite just yet. "What kind of potions do you have today?" He asked, with an upward turn of one corner of his mouth.

Thavrin looked up at her with his big, dark eyes, just in time to catch her studying him. Niranye was no bashful Nord girl, though—she was an Altmer, a lady of good breeding and refinement, and for all her relatively carefree nature she was raised to carry herself like the superior being that the High Elves thought themselves to be. She held his gaze and smiled, leaning forward on the wooden stall, and after a moment she pulled out a small crate of potions for him to look at. Thavrin picked through them, and he bought a healing potion and a few bottles of poison.

"Is there anything else?" She asked, still studying him. He had her now.

Thavrin tucked the potions away, taking a moment to think of the best emotion to display to her. He cleared his throat and looked back at her, briefly wet his lips, and said, "Yes—would you like to have a drink with me tonight?"

Niranye raised an eyebrow and smiled a little wider. "I was wondering when you'd ask. I'll see you at the New Gnisis Cornerclub tonight, right after I close shop for the night."

Thavrin gaped at her; he hadn't expected it to be quite this easy. "S-sure! I'll be there." He grinned boyishly and said farewell, and then he turned and walked away before her smile and her golden eyes could knock his feet out from under him. He didn't realize he'd been holding his breath until he passed the blacksmith's shop, and he exhaled.

He also had three grown men tailing him, without any pretense of subtlety. His grin widened, and he unlatched his glass mace from his belt. It really was turning out to be the best day ever. Thavrin stopped by the city gates and, without turning, asked them, "Here to teach me a lesson, boys?"

Their leader cracked his knuckles, and fancied himself intimidating in his steel plate armor. "Looks like we got ourselves a mind-reader. Hope you know a good healer, kid."

"Oh, I know a few spells of my own. No need to worry about me." He wanted to strike first, but he knew better. Two guards were watching him, the old cook had stopped chopping wood, and several civilians had gathered to see what would happen.

"A smart-mouth, no less." Thavrin could hear the hatred in the grizzled Nord's voice, and relished it. "Gonna break your head open, elf!" The ringing of steel reached Thavrin's ears as the man spoke—a greatsword being unsheathed.

Thavrin swung around and bashed the man across his face. The Nord staggered, and Thavrin wasted no time on the other two. He backed away, drawing their irate leader forward, and when the man attempted a power-attack, Thavrin dodged and struck him in the chest. The man's armor rang, and he bellowed in anger. The Redguard to the right of him slashed at Thavrin with his sword, catching his left arm. Thavrin jumped back, dodged the Nord's greatsword as it swung up to chop his other arm off, and swung again. His mace struck the broad side of the Nord's sword; he pulled back and swung again, and again, trying in vain to break the man's blocking stance.

Something small, sharp, and fast lodged itself in his side. It was an arrow; the third man had backed up onto the crumbling steps, and was taking aim at him again. Thavrin regretted walking around without his armor on, and decided to bring this to an end before he really got hurt. He backed off, squeezed his left hand shut around the portal inside of it, raised his arm, and released just as it reached critical mass. The doorway opened up, a swirling dark mass of warped space and light, and a Dremora lord emerged.

"_I smell weakness!_" Ah, Kynreeve. Thavrin always was partial to that one. The commoners cleared the area at the sight of the red and black Daedra, and the guards readied their weapons.

Dremora Kynreeve paid them no mind, however, and bore down on the two melee combatants, giving Thavrin a chance to put himself at a distance and pull out his bow. He took out the archer in three shots, and as Kynreeve drove his sword into the Redguard, Thavrin sent an arrow through the Nord's left eye. The Nord grunted and fell to his knees before collapsing.

"_There could be no other end._" Kynreeve sheathed his sword and watched impassively as Thavrin stripped the bodies of their goods. When it became obvious that they were both ignoring them, the guards lowered their own weapons and returned to their patrols.

"Now let's see… to whom do I owe a favor?" Thavrin dug through the leader's pockets after prying his armor off, and produced a tattered piece of parchment. "Oh…" It was Belethor, an obnoxious Breton who ran a shop in Whiterun. This had to be the third time he'd done this, and his frustration showed in the letter's wording:

_Look, I've sent people after these fetchers before, but they keep coming back. Forget about teaching them a lesson, just kill the little bastards! If I see them in Whiterun again, I swear I'll finish the job myself, and then I'll come after you! I have connections; you better keep that in mind! -Belethor_

Thavrin smiled dotingly and tucked the letter into his pocket. Mirriam would have a good laugh over this one later, and it'd be fun to see how forced Belethor's stupid grin and friendly act would be next time they strolled into town together. He pried the flimsy longbow from the third assailant's hand and, after rejecting the idea of going back to Niranye's stall, headed down to Sadri's Used Wares to sell all of their gear for a few septims; he'd buy everyone at the cornerclub a round tonight, and then he'd spend the rest buying every apple in this ugly little city. Kynreeve dutifully followed him down the road, only to be pulled unceremoniously back to his home-plane as they passed the gate to the docks.


	3. Issues

_**Issues**_

_I knew that it was stupid, that I wouldn't get the sun off me by stepping forward. But I took a step, one step, forward… The sea carried up a thick, fiery breath. It seemed to me as if the sky split open from one end to the other to rain down fire. My whole being tensed and I squeezed my hand around the revolver. The trigger gave; I felt the smooth underside of the butt; and there, in that noise, sharp and deafening at the same time, is where it all started. I shook off the sweat and sun. I knew that I had shattered the harmony of the day, the exceptional silence of a beach where I'd been happy. Then I fired four more times at the motionless body where the bullets lodged without leaving a trace. And it was like knocking four quick times on the door of unhappiness._

Albert Camus,_ The Stranger_

* * *

"So Harbinger," Vilkas said, "how did the rescue mission go? You got him home in one piece, yeah?"

"Oh yeah, no problem at all." Mirriam took a swig of mead. "He was shook up, but I think little Hemming is gonna be just fine." He'd been shook up, alright, especially after watching Thavrin pick off two itinerant Vigilants with no provocation, and after witnessing Mirriam help him dismantle a small band of Thalmor back on the way to Riften with their own maces. Come to think of it, he probably didn't enjoy watching the two of them sneak into the twilit Forsworn camp to retrieve him, slitting throats and plucking briar hearts under the dappled shadows of the juniper trees and standing stones, doing it that way just because it made them feel so alive. The guy seemed like too much of a milquetoast to be a Black-Briar; how much ass-licking did he have to do to make sure they didn't all chew him up and shit him out? Mirriam kept all that to herself, though, and smiled. "He'll be fine after a few days."

"Good, I knew we could count on you."

"Hmm."

The two of them ate in silence, and Farkas joined them halfway through their meal of spiced venison. He smiled at Mirriam as he sat down; she felt her face flush, but knew that as soon as he opened his mouth that burning feeling would pass. He was too sweet and innocent for his own good, and Mirriam had no idea how he managed to hold onto that childlike nature in a lifestyle like his.

"Hey, sister. Did you kill any spiders for me?"

Mirriam grinned and nodded. "I sure did. They were big, ugly guys too—all legs and dripping fangs…"

Farkas shuddered, and tore into a roasted goat leg to take his mind off of the spiders. She watched him fondly, sad that she could not, for a number of reasons, take Farkas with her in her travels. No way was she going to lose another friend for someone else's cause. After a minute and half a mug of mead she spoke. "So, do you have any work for me?"

"Yeah. There's a guy in Rorikstead who's been asking for a punch in the nose."

"Rorikstead? I was just headed out that way—I'll take care of it."

"Think you can do it without killing him?"

"Farkas, have I ever let you down?"

Farkas thought about it and then opened his mouth to reply, but was cut off by the sound of a chair being knocked over. On the other end of the mead hall, Njada and Athis were at it again, exchanging blows in their endless quest to out-punch each other, or exact vengeance for some real or perceived slight, or whatever their problem was. Neither of them had ever been forthcoming to her about what their deal was with each other, or to anyone else for that matter, and frankly Mirriam didn't want to get involved. For all she knew, this was a twisted, hellish courting ritual of theirs; whatever it was, it usually provided hours of entertainment for her and her shield-brothers.

Tonight was not a night for entertainment, though. Mirriam was dead-tired, and her bones were practically creaking from the pain and weariness of the abuse she'd endured in the past twenty-four hours. She wanted a cup of sap tea (_untainted, thank you very much…_) and a long night of peaceful sleep. Mirriam bid Farkas and Vilkas good night and dragged herself back to Breezehome.

#

Thavrin was surprised to see another Bosmer in the Cornerclub, let alone one who was supposed to have fled Skyrim by now. He pulled up a stool and sat down at the counter next to him, clapping the nervous little mer on the shoulder. "Hey there, cousin."

Malborn jumped and cringed away from him. His clothes and hair were a sweaty mess, and he had a sunken, peakish look about him. The color was gone from his face at the sight of Thavrin, though he hadn't much to him in the first place—not since he'd left the compound.

Thavrin pulled his hand away, and he offered him a bottle of mead. "Sorry. What are you doing out here, anyway? Want some mead? You look like you could use a stiff drink."

Malborn shook his head, keeping his hands folded and his shoulders hunched. He stared down at the well-worn counter, boring a hole through a bowl of cold grilled leeks with his dark eyes. "I should've been in Morrowind by now, but I think someone's out there, waiting for me—just waiting by the gate. Can't stay here, can't leave… he'll get me if I don't watch out. Something wrong with this town."

Thavrin frowned, and glanced at the sunlight that seeped through the large cracks and holes in the rickety wooden building. It was at a slant, but not too extreme—he had a few hours until sundown, plenty of time for a little fun. "What's this assassin look like?"

"Khajiit. Nice clothes, normal-looking. No one suspects him; the guards think I'm crazy."

"You're not crazy," Thavrin said with a reassuring smile, "just shook up. Can't say I blame you." Anyone would be sleepless and haggard after spending so much time among the Thalmor; they didn't seem to know how to treat their guests. Even Thavrin felt a little twitchy after his brief foray into the underbelly of the Embassy. He'd been right to go there in Mirriam's stead; he'd barely made it out alive, and weeks later, he still woke up in the middle of the night in a cold sweat, afraid to turn over in his bed for fear of seeing them, as if _not seeing_ them would keep them from watching, from waiting… No, the only good Thalmor was one with all his blood on the outside of his body, one whose face had been bashed in by a good, solid mace. Thavrin's love affair with blunt objects had been rekindled that night at the Embassy, when they'd proven that he still had a lot to learn about not being seen in close quarters…

Thavrin squeezed his eyes shut and opened them again, forcing the memories out of his head: the excruciating, bone-wrenching pain of being shot through with chain lightning spells in rapid succession; the cornered-rabbit feeling of cowering behind a crate, praying that they'd lose his trail before the invisibility potion ran out; of holding his breath for fear they could hear it; of the sticky gloss of blood on the flagstones; the burned-flesh smell; the rotting bodies in the cave, their faces like twisted, waxen masks of gaping-mouth horror and blind-eyed agony. He took a deep breath and licked his black lips, and downed his bottle of mead. Alcohol wasn't enough though, and he knew that damn well. Thavrin looked up and grinned at Malborn. "You'll be over the border by midnight."

"What?"

Thavrin stood up and put a few septims on the counter for the barkeep. His voice was full of cheer again, and a little less hushed now. "You heard me. You'll be over the border by midnight, cousin—I'll see to it."

Malborn looked up at him, and what he saw in Thavrin's glittering black eyes killed any doubt he had of his claim. He nodded and looked away, clutching his sleeves in white-knuckled fists and shifting in his seat. He tried not to flinch when Thavrin patted his arm.

If Thavrin noticed his discomfort, he didn't say anything. The smile never left his lips as he slung his bow and arrows over his shoulder and walked out into the howling wind. It would be an unbearably cold night, a bad night to sleep alone. But Thavrin had a few hours left, and no one in town would be the wiser if he stepped out for a bit.

As soon as he saw him cross the stone bridge, Kharjo motioned to Thavrin and ushered him over to Ahkari's tent. Ahkari greeted him with a curt nod, and a hint of what might have been sympathy, though for Thavrin it was hard to read a Khajiit's face very well.

"What your sister said last night was disturbing," Kharjo whispered, "but this one feels that he must apologize. She has been a good friend to this one, and you are both loyal customers. Kharjo will explain why we were upset, and also why Ahkari will no longer sell skooma to your sister." He guided Thavrin toward one of the many small tapestries that hung in the tent.

Some of them depicted familiar gods or historical scenes; others were completely alien to him. All of them were beautifully made, and were peopled almost exclusively by Khajiit of one type or another—Cathay-raht, Suthay-raht, Ohmes, great Pahmar-raht and little Alfiq, and others that Thavrin neither had a name for nor had seen in his short lifetime. They were, for the most part, lifelike and pastoral in nature, and very soothing to look at. Not so the one that Kharjo pointed out. It was simpler, done in an older style, though the tapestry itself was relatively new. It hung near other small, narrow tapestries that, judging by the symbols and imagery, Thavrin took to represent gods and Daedric Princes.

In this tapestry, the subject's unnaturally sinuous body wound around a bundle of standing sugar canes, the leaves of which were embroidered in silver thread. Its tricolor fur was streaked with vivid red blood from the bodies beneath it, and its long teeth and claws were like crescent moons that shone brightly against the muted background of the tapestry. Its black lips were pulled back in a feral grin, and its pink tongue almost seemed to move, as if it was panting under the sweltering desert sun that had been woven into the top of the wall hanging. Colorful birds flew around it, unmindful of the cat's ferocity, and some even perched on his back.

"This is what has visited your sister, yes?" Kharjo glanced at Thavrin, studying his inscrutable expression. "He is the Skooma-Cat, Sheggorath. Many take the skooma, and many have had his claws sunken into their backs, for he is covetous of the harvest. That is why his eyes are so green. Many have spoken to him, and many he has answered, for he has a heart filled with ardor and violence. That is why few have left his embrace."

Thavrin's eyes moved across the details of the tapestry, always coming back to those bloody paws and the wide eyes, green as a young leaf in early spring. The Skooma-Cat's eyes strayed from the path ahead of him, ostensibly in search of new prey. "Sheggorath, huh?"

"Yes. Though why he would appear to a human is beyond this one."

Thavrin pursed his lips and said nothing. The Khajiit maintained that their gods had nothing to do with anyone else's, and that they were a separate pantheon altogether, much like the Nord adherents of the "Old Way". The appeal of a long and futile theological debate escaped the both of them, and they stood in silence for a moment before Kharjo turned to Thavrin and placed his hand on his shoulder.

"This one will keep her in his prayers," he said. "_You_ must keep her from any skooma or moon sugar—the damage has already been done, but perhaps things will not be made worse if you are vigilant."

Thavrin nodded and put his hand on Kharjo's. "Thank you, friend. I'll keep an eye on her."

"But where is she?"

Thavrin cleared his throat. "Uhh… she's… she's in Windhelm."

Kharjo sighed and pinched the broad, fuzzy bridge of his nose.

"Well I'll see her soon! Really. We'll be in Solitude by the end of the month, and I'll make sure she's clean." Thavrin licked his lips and crossed his arms. "So, who's that new guy out there?" He nodded in the direction of a Khajiit in a red tunic, one who was standing near the road just outside the tent with his ears perked up.

"We've never met him before."

"Oh, well, do you need him for anything?"

Kharjo frowned, and his ear twitched. "No, I don't think so…"

"Okay, because if you don't mind, I'm just going to borrow him for a while." Thavrin crouched down and slid his bow off his shoulder, slipping past Ahkari and around to the back of the tent. He nocked an arrow and drew back the bowstring as he vanished from their eyesight, coming around the other side of the tent in the bare orange light of dusk. The newcomer had no idea he was there, and suspected nothing until he heard the arrow.

By the time the sound registered in his ears, the arrowhead had already torn halfway through his throat. A spray of blood struck the snow, forming a sort of halo around the shadow of his head. The Khajiit gagged and fell dead on the spot, startling Belyn Hlaalu as he walked past; his body hit the crisp snow face-down with a muted crunch, the last noise he would ever make.

Thavrin stood and shouldered his bow and strode over to the body, grinning ear-to-ear as he knelt down and went through its pockets, blissfully unaware of the fuss that everyone was kicking up around him as they tried to figure out who had killed the unknown Khajiit. As he walked down the icy stone bridge to the city, Thavrin jotted down a few notes in his journal and went through his ever-shifting to-do list. He had a bounty to collect before leaving, but that could wait until tomorrow. There was also some Guild business that demanded his attention—nothing that he couldn't handle, though.

When he got back inside the city walls, Faryl and Aval were already in their cups, laughing and hanging around outside the cornerclub. They hailed Thavrin loudly as he stepped up. "Oi Thavrin! 'Ow's your sister?" Shouted Faryl.

Thavrin frowned. "Uhh, fine? I guess?"

"Well you tell'er I said 'hi!'"

"Yeah, me too! Tell her we miss her!" Aval chimed in, and the two brothers laughed. Faryl nearly lost his footing and leaned on his brother for support, spilling half his ale in the process.

"Yeah, sure…" Thavrin shook his head and went inside. People sure seemed to like her here, at least in the Grey Quarter. But why? Had she not gotten drunk there yet? That hardly seemed possible.

"Thavrin! Welcome back!" Malthyr slung his arm around Thavrin's neck and pulled him over to the counter. "Can we get'cha a drink?"

"Wh… is everyone drunk already? Where's—"

"Anything you want, it's on me! Just tell your sister I said hello."

Thavrin narrowed his eyes as he took a seat at the bar. He had a feeling that he was being mocked in some way, though he couldn't quite figure out how. "Uhh, I better hold off for now. I'm waiting for a friend. Thanks, though." He sighed and shook his head as Malthyr went back to the impossible task of cleaning up the moldering, creaky floor, and out the corner of his eye he caught Ambarys chuckling to himself and shaking his head as he wiped down the bar with a damp rag.

_Is this skooma-time or something? Everyone's crazy but me…_

Malborn was watching him. Thavrin smiled and said, "Oh—you should be fine now. That assassin won't be bothering you anymore."

"Really?" Malborn's expression brightened somewhat at the news. "I can't thank you enough. I… I can finally leave this place, start over!"

"Think nothing of it, cousin. It's the least I can do for a fellow Bosmer."

Malborn was already off of his stool and halfway to the door. "I'll never forget this. Thank you, friend!" He walked out, passing by Niranye and practically running down the street.

Thavrin stood as Niranye entered the run-down building. She brushed the snow out of her hair and smiled at him, and the two of them took a seat in the corner near the door. "Good to see you again, Thavrin. I hope you haven't been waiting here this whole time."

"Wh-what? No, no, not at all!" Thavrin cleared his throat and folded one leg over the other, trying to look calm. "Would you like a drink?"

"Certainly—see if they don't have any good wine."

"Alright." Thavrin almost leapt out of his seat, but composed himself just in the nick of time. He stood up calmly and walked back over to the bar. "Hey, uhh, got any Alto wine?"

"'Course I do. 'Ere." Ambarys handed him a couple of bottles.

"Thanks." And then Thavrin added, just a bit louder, "Oh, and I'm buying everyone here a round by the way." He set down a small pouch of coins on the counter with a grin, and turned around to go back to his corner.

No one missed that announcement; it was met with cheers and raucous applause. Suvaris clapped him on the back and said, "You're alright, you know that? You're _almost_ as good as your sister!" She gave Malthyr a wink, and he snickered as he pushed some large, termite-bitten splinters of wood across the floor with his broom.

Thavrin blinked. An idea occurred to him—a slight sprout of a clue of what they just might be talking about.

_Oh gods, no…_

Thavrin sat back down and handed Niranye her bottle. "Do I want to know what they're on about?"

Niranye thought about it, and took a swig—the most refined and ladylike swig that Thavrin had ever witnessed. "Probably not, unless you'd like to hear about how your sister propositioned the entire Gray Quarter."

Thavrin nearly spat out his wine. He coughed and tried to breathe. "She did _what_?!" He wheezed. It explained her absence during the whole Calixto caper, at any rate.

"Don't worry; I don't think the whole neighborhood actually took her up on it. She's a very charismatic girl when she wants to be, though I think the fact that she'd blackened Stone-Fist's eyes probably helped her odds significantly." Niranye took another swig, watching him with much amusement as he took this all in.

Thavrin glanced around the room. Aside from a somewhat suspicious Belyn, no one seemed to be paying any mind to him anymore. The free booze probably helped. "The whole…"

"Mmhmm. It was a bit extreme, and perhaps too ambitious, but I like to think it made him feel stupid after accusing her of being an 'elf-lover.'"

Thavrin closed his eyes and sighed. "Okay, can we not talk about my sister anymore? It's kinda ruining the mood for me…"

"Oh? And what sort of mood should there be, hmm?" Niranye smiled and leaned closer, clearly enjoying the sight of Thavrin turning bright red. "Perhaps we might find a more suitable environment—the lights in here are a little bright."

Thavrin downed the entire bottle right then and there.

#

Mirriam flopped face-down into the stack of pelts and hay that Nords called a "bed" and sighed loudly. While there weren't enough booze and illegal substances in Whiterun to dull the pain, it dawned on her that it would be a while until the fatigue by itself would knock her out for the night. Mirriam groaned and rolled around on the bed in frustration, and after a minute she decided that she'd be in no less pain asleep than awake. Might as well party down while she waited for sleep to happen—kind of like celebrating every moment that she didn't have to spend with the loud, smelly Mad God.

In fact, the more she thought about it that way, the more excited she became, and the more she (almost) forgot about her aching bones and sore muscles. And everyone knew the best cure for a headache was more booze.

Mirriam stumbled downstairs and out onto the street, and made her way up to the Drunken Huntsman for a couple rounds, for once glad that her blood-brother wouldn't be there to nag and cajole her into staying put, or being responsible, or any number of those things he liked to talk about when he forgot that he was supposed to be having a good time too. Jenassa would be in her usual corner, like always, and hell if the two of them couldn't figure out a good way to drown out the pain and boredom.

#

It was nothing but awkward groping and vaguely-intoxicated kisses from her door to her bed. Actually, Thavrin was the only one who was vaguely intoxicated, and only because he'd guzzled a whole bottle of wine in less than a minute. His sister would have teased him mercilessly; given the circumstances, he was so very glad that she was halfway across the province. Skooma rehab could wait.

Niranye pulled the leather cord that held his hair back and ran her fingers through his coarse, shiny locks. He fumbled with the laces of her corset while she unclasped his black cloak and tossed it aside. "How many times do you change your clothes in one day?"

Thavrin stood on his toes and kissed her from neck to collarbone, still trying to undo a knot that he'd somehow made worse. "I needed my armor—I told you I didn't wait around all day."

"Oh?" She brushed aside his hands and undid it herself, and he unbuckled her belt instead. "And what were you doing?"

"Things." The belt and all its pouches hit the floor with a heavy thud. He stroked the delicate curve of her hips, admiring every contour and angle in the firelight. Altmer were such tall and angular creatures, some of them to the point of looking pinched and severe. Not so with Niranye; in sobriety she was more than beautiful, and in the haze of wine and lust she looked as though she'd been crafted by Dibella's own hand.

"'Things?'" Her hands slid across his chest, but she kept her eyes on his face, studying his black eyes and the unreadable expression that crept across his features too often for most people's comfort.

"Aye. Important things." He took her hands in his and kissed her fingers tenderly.

She glanced down at the crest on his breastplate, a black bird with an odd emblem above its head. "You must be a very busy young man. I haven't seen that crest in years."

He followed her gaze down to his chest, and then looked up at her with a lopsided smile. "You've seen it before? You know a lot of interesting people, I assume." He unbuckled his gauntlets and let them fall to the floor, and slid her apron over her head.

"Perhaps I do." Niranye watched him for a moment while he removed the rest of his armor, and then pushed him down onto the bed.

Thavrin smiled and held his hand out to her. "Do you know any killers?"

Niranye froze. "Killers?"

"Anyone who might have killed a Nord girl not too long ago, in fact? One by the name of Fjolti?"

Niranye's lip curled into a sneer. "I hope you're not implying—"

"That you were involved? No. You're not the dangerous type." He took Niranye's hand and pulled her down on top of him, stroking the outline of her cheekbone with his thumb.

She followed his lead for now, hoping he wouldn't muck things up too badly with all this talk, and knowing that he just might. Some Bosmer didn't know how to keep their mouths shut. "And how do you know that I'm not dangerous?"

"You would've known better than to let me in here." He could tell by the way her posture stiffened that she was now regretting the decision to do so; he sat up and kissed her gently on the lips. "Don't worry; you're not the one I'm after, I'm sure of it." He kissed her again and nuzzled her, trying to make sure he'd remember her scent and the smoothness of her skin when he was out on the road by himself in the future.

Niranye turned her face from him. "You don't know who you're dealing with. The people I'm working for now aren't petty thieves, and they have no compunction about killing their marks." She pulled away and sat on the edge of the bed. "In fact, that's the way they _prefer_ to operate."

Thavrin propped himself up on his elbows and sighed. "Niranye, I've taken down a giant with just four arrows. I've cleared bandit camps in broad daylight without them ever seeing their attacker. Today I put down three hired thugs and a professional assassin without any assistance—and I did that all _right before_ I was supposed to meet you tonight. Anyone you're afraid of I can put out of commission permanently. Just tell me where they are, and they'll stop being a problem. I promise that whatever business they give you will be nothing compared with what the Guild is pulling in these days—and we'll do it _without_ threatening you, or anyone else."

Niranye thought about it, staring at her lap. "So, is this just business?"

Thavrin shook his head. "No. I take care of the ones I…"

Niranye's head shot up, her golden eyes wide open. Her neat eyebrows flew halfway up her forehead in surprise.

No! _No!_ His brain worked just fast enough to bring his tongue to a screeching halt; he backed up and tried again, sitting up and running a hand through his hair. "Well, I mean I helped a guy I've known for only two weeks, but we went through some real deep shit together—not that you don't mean more to—I mean, I…" He could feel his face getting hot underneath the smeared black war-paint, and he knew damn well he couldn't blame it on the wine.

Niranye sighed and pushed him back down. "If you can promise me that your aim is better than your communication skills, then I'll stop worrying."

"I'll never give you reason to doubt me, Niranye," he whispered, "You can trust me." Thavrin rolled her over onto her back and pushed up the hem of her shift, leaving a trail of warm, soft kisses from her knee to the thatch of reddish hair between her thighs, taking his sweet time, savoring every sigh and gasp that he drew from her with his tongue.

#

Mirriam woke up between Gildergreen and a bench with a raging headache and one hand shoved down her pants. Cabbages were strewn across the whole plaza, someone's loincloth hung from the branches of the sacred tree, and Brenuin was cuddled up next to the Grey-Manes' old brown cow, sleeping like a baby as it chewed its cud. A stray mutt licked her bare left foot, and her boot was somewhere outside her immediate range of vision, which didn't bother her too much at the moment. Jenassa was across the square from her, lying half-naked in the stream of cold water that ran through the walkways. She was snoring loudly enough to drown out Heimskr's endless hollering.

_Wait a minute…_

Mirriam sat up, startling the dog away, and smoothed her disheveled hair back. Heimskr wasn't preaching; Mirriam squinted up at the sky and realized that it was about an hour or two before the sun would rise, which explained why it was still kind of dark out. _Well, I guess I haven't drunk myself blind quite yet._ Mirriam stood and brushed herself off, ignoring the reproachful cough of a passing guard, and went to greet the outspoken priest, grabbing her left boot from under a ruined trellis along the way. She paused just in time to remember that he would respond to her simple greeting with a wide-eyed, long-winded discourse on the nature of Talos and his tenets; and to realize that she'd be compelled to stick around and listen to his claptrap because he'd been rendered homeless by the war and she felt bad about that. Mirriam turned on her heels and woke up Jenassa instead.

Jenassa gave Mirriam her typical morning greeting—a half-asleep punch in the face, or in the general direction thereof. Mirriam dodged and placated her with promises of wine and breakfast, and then helped her friend stand up.

To call her march back to Breezehome a "walk of shame" would be to presume that Mirriam felt any shame in the first place, but she had only apathy and a dull ache in shame's long-standing absence—hunger, too. As she passed through the market she winked at Sigurd, who was standing outside Belethor's shop with a hunk of bread in his hand. He gaped at her as she strutted past, and scurried back inside the shop.

Soon enough Mirriam was standing at the cooking fire, tending to some thinly-sliced horker meat as it sizzled and popped in its own fat. She cracked open two fresh pine thrush eggs onto the griddle, taking care not to break the yolks, and tossed a couple slices of bread on the grill beneath.

Jenassa sat on a bench with a thick wool blanket around her shoulders and a mug of mulled wine in her hands. She watched Mirriam as she fussed over breakfast, enjoying the smell of it. "I miss eating like this every morning. Who was it that taught you to cook?"

"Thavrin. He's as good with a cauldron as he is a mortar and pestle."

"Well, you'll both make fine wives someday."

Mirriam snorted. "And you'd make a great husband if you didn't wake up swinging your fists. The night terrors aren't much fun, either." She flipped the toasts with the tip of a dagger she'd pulled off the weapon rack, and checked to see if the eggs were done yet.

"The Nords seem to think it's not a marriage without a few fist-fights."

"Well you'll fit right in here, then. Maybe Ysolda'll have you. Carlotta seems to like you, anyway."

"Hmmm. Guess she was spoiled for men." Jenassa drew her knees to her chest and smiled. "And what about you? The young heiress turned you down, did she?"

"Hmph." Mirriam picked the toasts up onto a plate and slid the eggs onto them, trying to keep the yolks from running off of the slices. She served them up with the fried horker and sat down with her friend. "I don't care. She doesn't want anyone, and frankly I ain't ready to settle down. Got too much on my plate."

"You seemed rather broken up about it last night."

"What?" Mirriam didn't even remember talking about it.

"A few bottles of mead, and you were ready to dissolve in a puddle of tears. It was pathetic, really. How _you_ managed to take the Ebony Mail is beyond me."

"Wh—now that was just—look, people do all kinds of dumb things when they're drunk! Like that thing with that thing with Torvar and the vegetable cart… I think we tried to create a new sport last night." Mirriam scowled as she tried to think of how in Mara's name they'd thought that one up.

"Perhaps, but I don't think that cabbage-stickball will be very popular if this war keeps on any longer."

"Mm. Hopefully they'll have Ulfric's dumb head on a pike soon. Can't believe I ever thought about bedding that fetcher." Any attraction she'd had toward him ended when she overheard that canned speech of his back in the Palace of Kings, the one about men dying in his arms and such. Mirriam didn't care if he'd been in a prisoner in the Great War or not—no _real_ soldier ever came home and made pretty, "heartfelt" speeches about his comrades' losses for his boot-licking cronies all day. Her old man sure didn't. The Jarl of Windhelm smelled like a fraud, or at least like a deluded tin-pot dictator. If what Thavrin had told her about his dossier was correct, then the latter was the more likely, and potentially dangerous, of the two possibilities.

"Mirriam!" Jenassa punched her in the arm, just hard enough to snap her out of it.

"Ow!" Mirriam rubbed her arm and glared at Jenassa. "N'Oblivion was _that_ for?"

"You were staring into space again. I was trying to tell you that he's probably out of your league anyway."

"Oh. Guess so." Mirriam sipped her wine and took a bite of her egg toast. The two of them ate in silence, and then Mirriam stood and climbed upstairs to suit up.

"Where are you off to now?" said Jenassa between bites of horker meat.

"Solitude."

"Business?"

"Like always." Mirriam jumped back down, arrayed neck to foot in ebony. She sat back down next to Jenassa and braided up her half-head of hair.

Jenassa watched her. "Need any help?"

"You know my policy about that. I don't get my friends killed—not anymore."

Jenassa pouted. "What about your brother?"

"He's enlisted in the Legion, like me. He was with me in Helgen, and long before that. He's a different story, and damn if I could stop him lookin' out for me anyway." Mirriam pulled the Wabbajack off the weapon rack, ignoring Jenassa's frustrated sigh. There was no telling when some mendicant madman would stumble up to her with the intent of being "blessed" by the staff of the Mad God, and it might even come in handy in the future. Mirriam examined the three faces carved into the staff before putting it away, and turned to her friend. "Stick around if you want," she said, "sleep off all the mead. I'm heading out now. Don't know when I'll see you again, but it's been fun."

"Mirriam."

"Mm?"

"Who did you lead to the Sacellum? I understand if you don't want to tell me…"

Mirriam glanced down at her armor, and then back up at her friend. "Someone who didn't deserve it, someone who wasn't so bright. I beat him fair n' square in a fist-fight in Morthal, and he figured that meant we were friends. Man had no business leaving his swamp, but he went with me all the way to the Pillar without batting an eye."

Jenassa was silent for a moment, studying the young Breton. "Do you ever regret it?"

Mirriam thought about it, and then shook her head. "No. He made his choice, and I made mine. That was the last time I ever asked anyone to lay down and die for me."

###


	4. Cry for the Weeper

He didn't do it often—there was no need, really, and most of his time was spent in the wild with his sister and the bandits and animals. When they were the city, though, the people were soft and easier marks, and it was no trouble keeping him and Mirriam fed that way.

Thavrin was nearly twelve years old by then, on the cusp of adulthood as far as the smallfolk were concerned, but his wide, dark eyes and smooth, olive-toned skin were still enticing to some. He had no trouble taking a man by the hand and leading him down a dark alleyway, and no compunction, no fear—just a mask of mute bewilderment and quiet, unadorned shyness. That, and a little boredom, made it so easy to reel them in at certain times of the day, in the hot summer months between planting and harvest, between meetings with merchants and statesmen, in the hazy hour before vespers.

He'd usually have Mirriam sit in the temple, or leave her in a book store—this time she was at a corner table in a small, quiet inn, chewing on a heel of stale bread dipped in cheap ale while she waited for him to return. He didn't tell her where he was going. There was no need, and at any rate he could never make her understand. She was such a fearful girl then, and wouldn't ever let him out of her sight again if she knew what he did when he went away.

Thavrin never carried a knife on him at these times, or a sword or bow. Those were a dead giveaway, and all he really needed was a little pin, a pin stuck into a bit of soaked rags tucked into his belt. Milk thistle, nightshade, fennel seeds, and wisp stalk caps were easy enough for him to find, and deadly when boiled down to a thick concentrate. When his victim lifted him onto the crate and slipped Thavrin's tunic over his head, Thavrin already had the pin in hand. He jabbed the man's arm, grabbed a loose cobblestone he'd hidden there earlier, and straddled the man's chest as he lost use of his limbs and fell to the ground. The Imperial's eyes were the only thing that could move; he was paralyzed, and his left arm felt numb like the rest of him, and then it started to burn. The fire spread, and he wanted to scream, to murder the expressionless child whose hands were now all over him, searching for gold and jewelry. The sensation finally came back into the man's limbs, but Thavrin was ready. He lifted the rock, pushed the man's head back, and was about to bash his face into a red pulp, but something stayed his hand.

"Oh, brilliant! Just stab him, though. It takes forever to set their features right."

A gray hand clamped down on the man's mouth to stifle his screams. The Dunmer handed Thavrin a sharp steel knife, and held the man's right arm down just as he'd worked it out from between Thavrin's skinny legs. Thavrin didn't hesitate. He swallowed and licked his lips as he sank the blade into the right side of the man's soft neck; his new friend watched with unblinking, bright red eyes as the boy used both hands to drag the blade across the throat, leaving a jagged trough of pale skin that soon welled over with hot, syrupy blood. The man writhed and struggled, still weak from the poison but wide awake from fear and pain, and he screamed as loud as he could until the blood filled his windpipe, and then he coughed and gagged and no one heard him, even when the Dunmer uncovered his mouth.

"Good, good—right through the artery. Here, hold his legs down; I'll get his arms…"

Thavrin nodded and licked his lips again. He stuck one of his blood-stained fingers in his mouth and sucked on it when he thought his accomplice wasn't looking, and sat on the man's legs as they jerked uselessly. It took him a couple of minutes to lose consciousness and stop moving; his eyes were wide and almost completely rolled back into his head. The blood spread across the cobblestones, and seeped into the wood of the rotting crates that sat against the wall.

The stranger wiped his hands on his black robes and motioned for Thavrin stand up, which he did. "Thank you, child. What perfect timing! You can keep the knife—think of it as payment. And here," he pulled a wrapped piece of boar meat from his knapsack and placed it carefully on the crate next to Thavrin and added, "for the pleasure of working with you. The look on his face when you poisoned him was just priceless! I shall never forget it in all my years." The Dunmer hoisted the dead body onto an old, stained tarp from his knapsack and rolled it up, humming softly to himself.

"Are you a necromancer?" Thavrin asked as he put his tunic back on. He'd never actually spoken to one in all his three years of vagrancy.

He looked up and gave Thavrin a thin, tight smile. "I am. Are you frightened?"

Thavrin shook his head 'no,' and he meant it. "What's your name?"

###

_Shhhhh... don't tell my beta! I just thought I'd whet your appetite while you all wait patiently for a real, honest-to-god chapter. It's in the wings, I assure you. In the meantime, I hope you enjoyed this little (woefully un-beta'd) flashback._

_D.C.W._


	5. LanguageViolence

_**Language/Violence**_

_"I caught their sparkle from the runway_

_Such a fool for the Amazon_

_Nothing's wrong but it's just not right_

_The three of us in the naked light_

_No chance for psychotic solutions_

_Lost in this three-way dimension_

_Imagine you as me_

_And I'll tell you just what I'm thinking"_

_Orgy, Dramatica_

* * *

Masser loomed low and dark in the deep night, the only witness as a lone Bosmer braced himself against the icy cold of an Eastmarch night on his trek to the city of Blacklight. His ears echoed with the crunch of feet in fresh snow and with the shrieking wind as it lashed his ears and cheeks. He glanced over his shoulder again, unable to shake the feeling that he was being watched, that something was closing in. He managed to kill a frost troll that had been dwelling in a crumbling tower along the way, but the paranoia refused to die. It hid in the edges of his vision, in the long shadows of the pines and in the wisps of swirling snow. The night sky was dim; all the stars and dancing auroras kept their light from him in the final hours before dawn.

Young hands, red from the cold, strained to pull back a bowstring. A poison-tipped arrow was notched and leveled, and shot out from behind a snowdrift. It found its way into the back of the weary traveler, but wasn't enough to kill him.

The Bosmer felt the bite of a rusty arrow, stumbled on the loose and icy cobblestones, and fell to the earth. He saw sparks in the corners of his dark eyes, and his limbs burned from the inside as the venom coursed through his veins and into his pounding heart. He blinked, tried to force the sluggishness from his mind and body—frostbite venom, insidious, though short-lived in its effects. He reached down to unsheathe his weapon as he stood, but behind him someone brought a crude iron mace up to meet the back of his unhelmed head. The pain blinded him, and the force sent him facedown into the ice and snow once more. He tried to call for help, or to scream, or to groan—anything—but all that came from his mouth was a thick gargling and a spattering of blood. His limbs no longer heeded his commands.

The mace fell against the back of his head again, and the pain was gone. It had ceased to be real before this, edged out of the Bosmer's consciousness by all-encompassing panic and horror. He couldn't move. He couldn't move. He couldn't move, oh gods he couldn't move. He could see but all he saw was the ground and a boulder, he couldn't see his attacker…

The mace fell once more, and Malborn left the living world.

#

Mirriam took another pull at her way-too-warm jug of wine and squinted at the map. Rorikstead was supposed to be somewhere northwest of her real target—a little giant camp that was too well-guarded for normal junkies to approach. Mirriam, however, was no ordinary junkie. No, she was a junkie who could cast muffle and, more recently, invisibility, and didn't need to carry a bunch of invisibility potions like some wet-behind-the-ears scrub who just got off the farm with his dead grandpa's staff.

Oh no. Like any Breton worth her salt, Mirriam was tough and just positively chockfull of spells—absolutely distended with magical properties. Not only that, but she had a sword, a sword that could set people and animals on fire, and any giant stupid enough to _not_ look the other way when she was creeping past was going to get a face full of white-hot fury. Mammoths? Cooked in a blanket of flames, flames fueled by their own nasty back-hairs and buttery sebaceous fluids.

Her stomach gurgled. She stopped mid-thought. It was high noon, and not only was she slightly drunk, but she was ridiculously hungry, as if she hadn't had that big, greasy breakfast back in Whiterun. She'd changed into her normal scaled armor earlier, too hot and too hungry to stomp around in all those layers of black metal plates and mail, and too sore from the accumulated abuse. This did little to improve her current situation, however.

"Shit…"

Mirriam shielded her eyes against the glare of the angry sun that beat down on the rolling, deer-trodden plains, and counted a total of one giant and two mammoths. Between her and the camp was a sabre cat, bathing in the sun with its tawny head resting on its great paws, the whole creature blending in among the sweet-smelling grasses. Mirriam felt her stomach take a little dip instinctively, even though its fur was an ordinary, non-crazy color. _No big deal. That cat is toast. Maybe it won't even notice me. Naw, not if I creep in there all muffled and—_

That's when she spotted the little bastard—a raggedy, filthy old Bosmer with sunken eyes and yellow teeth, and a scent almost as bad as his master's.

"Dervenin…" Mirriam gritted her teeth and hastily shoved her map into the knapsack, nearly tearing it. Last time she saw him, he was shuffling around in a circle up in Solitude, begging for help and handing out dead people's bones, and doing all this in proximity to a group of small children whom, in Mirriam's opinion, he had no business being near. It turned out he was just a harmless old coot, about as mean and dangerous as a kitten that couldn't find its mother. This did nothing to endear him to her, though, especially now that his master had decided to visit his foolishness upon her everyday life. As far as Mirriam was concerned, Dervenin was the root of her whole big problem with Sheogorath.

But what was he doing out there? Why was he not back on the Isles with the other head-cases and tweekers?

And what in Oblivion was he doing so close to _her _sap tree?

Mirriam took a deep breath, determined not to lose her shit, especially on account of one of _his_ followers. She cast muffle and crouched down, slipping through the fragrant grasses toward the tree until the mammoths spotted her. They did nothing, of course. Not yet. They grazed quietly with their giant keepers. She glanced at the sabre cat one more time, to make sure it was still sunning itself and not galloping up to claw her face off, and then cast invisibility with a self-satisfied smirk. _Heh._

Everything within shouting distance heard the loud crack of magicka and saw the flash of light, and knew precisely where she was. The mammoths trumpeted and thundered forth. The giants came stomping up, brandishing their clubs. The sleepy sabre cat raised its head and growled. _Shit._

She couldn't deal with this, not all at once, and not on an empty stomach. The last thing Mirriam saw as she turned to run away was Dervenin creeping through the shallow pool, putting his filthy hands on the spigot. _Shit!_

Mirriam tore across the prairie without aim, hoping that the sabre cat would distract the giants and the mammoths for at least a moment, or that one of them would notice Dervenin. None of that was happening, and the forces of nature were united with the two giants in eliminating Mirriam. _Shit!_

Mirriam was headed for a precipice of some sort. _Shit! _Hopefully it wasn't too long a fall. _Shit!_ She jumped. _Shitshitshitshitshitshiiiiii iit!_ She fell about three feet, and skinned her knee a little. _Oh… that's not so bad…_ The sabrecat soared over the small outcropping of rock and nearly landed on her, its hind claws grazing the bare half of her head. _Shit!_ Mirriam unsheathed Dawnbreaker and swung furiously, hoping she could kill the thing before the giants found her.

She didn't. The first giant swung his club in a wide arc and brought it to bear in a nice backhand swing; it smashed into her, breaking a few ribs with a loud crack as she sailed several feet away. The sabre cat, unperturbed, batted at her face with a snarl as she flew past him. Mirriam had just enough wits about her to roll into a standing position, and she high-tailed it for where Rorikstead was supposed to be, praying to whomever was listening and not laughing at her that the guards could handle a few giants and mammoths, and that someone would have a stiff drink waiting for her—a lot of them, in fact.

The smallfolk heard her from a long way off—a long, solitary shout of frustration and pain and anger cut through the tranquility of another dull day in the little agrarian settlement. Reldith lifted her golden eyes and peered into the blue horizon, and spied a column of dust. It couldn't be bandits; the farmstead wasn't very well-guarded since the war was on, but bandits usually only attacked at night, and tried to be a little stealthier than this. She studied the dust cloud a bit longer and concluded that bandits were incapable of herding mammoths, and would never be clever enough to use them in combat. "Ennis, dear," she said, "I think we should go inside now."

"Huh? What for?" That's when he noticed the odd vibration coming from the ground beneath his feet, and the sound of angry mammoths, and the noise of a stampede headed his way. Reldith already had him by the arm and was dragging him inside, and as he looked over his shoulder, he saw what looked like a distressed bandit with a bad haircut and, as Reldith shoved him inside the house with their chickens, he saw the source of the bandit's trouble—two giants, two mammoths, and a bloodied sabre cat. He locked the door after Reldith and barricaded it with the table. "Shor's bones! What was that all about?"

"How should I know? Let's hope they don't plan on staying here." Reldith sighed and took a seat by the hearth. "I guess we won't be getting anymore work done today."

Ennis frowned and sat down next to her. "Huh, yeah, I guess. Y'think the others made it to safety?" He stared at the fire, and as he sat there it occurred to him that the bandit looked kind of familiar.

Inside the tavern, Mirriam collapsed with her back against the door, trying to catch her breath. The boozy haze was gone, the adrenaline ran dry, and all the abuse and partying of the previous forty-eight hours and beyond came home to roost. She grunted and clutched her side, and pulled the biggest, most potent healing potion she had out of her knapsack. Leaning against the door for support, she stood and chugged the potion on her way up to the counter. From the corner of her eye she spotted a handsome, red-headed young man, just old enough to have a decent Nord beard. He gaped at her as she wiped her mouth with the back of her hand and lobbed the empty bottle into the fire pit. Sparks leapt up from the broken glass and the traces of potion they held.

Mirriam winked at the young man and pulled up a stool and leaned against the counter. "Gimme yer strongest mead, I feel like I'm about to die."

Mralki, the barkeep, wasn't impressed by her shenanigans. "'Bout to die? Do it outside, then. I don't need your corpse stinkin' up the place."

Mirriam pounded the bar with her fist. "Dammit, man! If you knew what I've been through these past two troll-fetchin' days, you'd—"

"_Hey_!" Mralki slapped his hand down on the countertop, making her jump. "This is a family establishment. You watch your language! Now if y'want a drink then you'd better settle down."

Mirriam opened her mouth to reply, but then she realized that the satisfaction of a witty comeback wouldn't temper her headache. "Fine. Gimme all the mead you got. And the ale. And the wine. Money's no object."

"I ain't givin' you all my stock—just who do you think you are?! Here, here's two bottles of mead, take'm or leave'm." Mralki slammed two bottles down in front of her and crossed his arms, staring her down.

Mirriam glowered and sneered at him, but in the end it did no good. "_Fine_." She shoved a fistful of septims across the counter at him, snatched the two bottles of ale, and headed for the door.

Mralki pocketed the septims and took up his rag, wiping down his countertop meticulously where Mirriam had been sitting. "Hmph. Good riddance. Got enough trouble 'round here with Lemkil shootin' his mouth off…"

Mirriam stopped dead in her tracks. "Lemkil?"

"Yeah. Hoary-headed fella, stupid mustache, meaner n' a drunken Daedra, has two kids. You know'm?"

She narrowed her eyes and looked over her shoulder at the barkeep. "Yeah, I got an appointment with him. Know where he is right about now?"

Mralki raised his eyebrows, and his expression softened a bit. "He'll be out in the fields 'bout this time. Tell you what—you take care 'o your appointment with him, and then come back later. You'll have a couple'a rounds waitin' for you here—on the house."

Mirriam said nothing, and simply nodded as she opened the door and walked out. _That must be the client. What's his deal with this Lemkil guy?_ She had no difficulty picking him out; the giants and the mammoths apparently had given up their chase, and the guards made quick work of the wounded sabre cat, so the farmers came back out of their homes and went back to the fields. Two girls were tussling in the dirt near the inn, one of them seemingly at a disadvantage to the other. _There's his kids, I guess…_ Across the road, a man in a filthy tunic was harvesting wheat. _Gray hair, dumb mustache—that's him._ The man finally turned around and screamed at the children to lay off, raising a hand in warning. The two girls scattered, and Mirriam knew she had her target.

Mirriam swaggered up, guzzling her mead as she did, and tapped him on the shoulder. "Hey you. I have a message from someone." When Lemkil ignored her, she tossed the empty over her shoulder, roughly grabbed Lemkil and swung him around. "Hey, you hayseed! You deaf or somethin'?"

"What'n Oblivion d'you want, woman? I'm trying to work, here. I'm the only one 'round here seems to remember that's what a farm is for."

"Yeah, well, work can wait." It seemed like violence was the only thing Nords paid attention to, and in her surly state of mind, it suited Mirriam just fine. She didn't wait for him to swing first, and delivered a swift right hook to the man's jaw. He staggered back, and put up his fists. They circled each other, and Mirriam spat at his shoes, prompting him to haul back and deck her.

Mirriam took it square in the chin and sneered. She could tell already that he wouldn't be worth the effort, but damn if she didn't need to push someone's face in at that moment—if not Dervenin's then this guy's face would suit. Mirriam pummeled him with a barrage of short, sharp blows, breaking through his meager defense so she could land a real punch.

"Those fools are actually fighting…"

"Who taught you how to fight? Put those fists up!"

They were drawing a crowd, but Mirriam didn't pay them much mind. She rolled and ducked out of the way as he swung at her. The man was short of breath by now, having wasted most of his energy on the first underwhelming attempts at knocking her out in one blow, and his dirty face glistened with sweat. He seemed to have lead feet, or maybe he just didn't understand the value of footwork, and hitting him was easy as falling down for Mirriam.

She jabbed at his chin once, twice, and then jumped back as his fist clumsily arced in toward her left eye. "Dumbass. How'd you survive long enough to get gray hairs?"

"You bitch!" Lemkil swung again, and again, growing angrier with each missed blow. "Keep runnin' that mouth off—see if I don't knock it 'round the other side o' your head!"

"You couldn't hit the broad side of a barn, you dumb shit!" Mirriam spat out a thick wad of bloody spit—evidence that he actually did get a shot in once in a while—and answered with a open-handed strike to his ear. "Like that? That's what I call Cave Bear Style!" Mirriam grinned, only to have his fist smash into her teeth. She grunted and stumbled backward a few paces. "Ohhh no. Oh no! No one jacks me in the mouth!" She spat again and pulled her fist back, and brought it to bear against his nose. There was a loud snap, his head went back, and he crumpled to the ground. Mirriam rubbed her sore right fist, and ran her tongue across the backs of her teeth to make sure they were all still in place. "You give up?"

Lemkil crouched in the dirt at her feet, trying to catch his breath and steady himself. "Damn you, I give."

"Good. Now I was supposed to tell you something. Let's see…" Mirriam pulled a small, stained piece of paper out from under her breastplate and read it out loud. "'Next time you're frustrated at your girls, remember what it's like to feel this small and humiliated and…' huh? Who wrote this tripe? What's this even about—" She looked up from the paper again, realizing that his kids had been watching the whole thing.

They were silent, hollow-eyed, and had cheered for no one during the brawl. Neither moved to help their father; they stood huddled away from him, as if he was a wounded pit-wolf shoved into the same tiny cell as them.

It all clicked for Mirriam then. She'd seen enough of it growing up in the streets—ignorant, angry, wretched people, some of them just doing what their parents had done to them without really giving it any thought. He looked like he knew better, or maybe she just hoped that he could be taught. Mirriam seized the man by the collar and hoisted him up until he was nose-to-nose with her, and looked him in the eye. "Listen, you sunnuva bitch," she whispered, "I wasn't sent out here to kill you, but once I report back to my employer, ain't nothin' but the law keepin' me from coming back and killing you. _I can make it look like an accident._ You just keep that in mind next time you decide to push anyone around—I don't give a runny shit about Nord laws. You get me?"

Lemkil shoved her away and straightened his tunic. "Don't you tell me what to do! What I do in my home is my business, and you can take that straight back to Mralki! That's right—don't think I don't know who paid them to send you out here. And _you two_!" He turned on the two girls, grabbing one of them by the shirt. "What'n Oblivion do you think you're doin', standin' around like that while yer pa gets his arse handed to 'm?! You think this's funny?" He'd seized the weaker of the two, it seemed; she wilted under his gaze, shying away in anticipation of some violence.

Mirriam had no idea how bad it was, or whether he was all bark and no bite. It made no difference to her; she was seeing red and too sober for her taste. She grabbed his wrist in her vice-like grip, pried free the little girl's shirt, and shoved the child behind her. "You keep pushin' smaller people around, and somebody bigger than you's gonna come in and wipe the floor with your arse." Mirriam tightened her grip on his wrist until he could no longer hide the pain, and then brought her knee up into his side, right around where his kidney was. "Case in point." She kneed him in the side again, and then grabbed him by the back of the shirt and swung him around, flinging him down the steps onto the main path that cut through the settlement. Lemkil groaned and curled into a ball, holding his side. "Furthermore, my organization prides itself in its customer-satisfaction rate. I've been asked to teach you a lesson, and I don't plan on leaving until you've gotten that lesson through your thick skull." She walked down the steps and gave him a sharp kick in his other kidney; Lemkil yelped and curled up tighter. "Shall we continue, or have I made myself clear?"

"I give! I give, damn you! You made your point already, tell'm I won't touch 'em again!"

"Good. Sounds like someone's holdin' you accountable. Good day." Mirriam gave him a curt nod and walked around him back toward the inn. She was going to need a long nap in addition to the promised booze, and a nice long period of isolation from her fellow man. The weight of what was going on there in Rorikstead was settling in, along with the realization that she probably hadn't made things any better. She was just doing what she was hired to do, but was smacking Lemkil around going to make him stop beating his kids, or whatever he was up to? Mirriam felt a little sick as she opened the door, and for a brief moment she thought of forgoing the alcohol.

_Wait, let's not go to extremes, here._

Mirriam accepted the bottles of Alto wine from Mralki, whose disposition toward her had undergone a miraculous transformation in the past ten minutes, and took them right to the room she'd subsequently paid for. Mirriam downed them both and lay face down on the bed; sleep wasted no time in overtaking her this time, and she drifted into a fitful nap full of violent, repetitive dreams and nightmares fueled more by frustration than fear.

#

Two watchmen outside by a pitiful little campfire, two in the ice caves, two in the chamber. Thavrin was glad that he hadn't eaten that morning. He cut through their cheap leather armor to get at the soft flesh beneath, the warm, steaming hearts, the rich red blood. He ate haphazardly, tearing handfuls of flesh from their corpses as he went along, wiping his mouth on the back of his gloved hands. After gorging himself, Thavrin took a swig of alto wine and rummaged through the battered chest nearby, taking his sweet time and enjoying the peace and quiet before he had to take out the ones in the chamber beyond the battered door in front of him.

The hideout itself was a subterranean structure built underneath the ice caverns. It didn't make much sense to Thavrin, who didn't particularly enjoy the cold weather of Skyrim, or the idea of being surrounded by ice, and sleeping next to chilly stone walls every night. Sitting down on top of the chest, Thavrin rubbed his arms for warmth and sighed, feeling miserable and lonely with only half-eaten corpses for company. In times like this, when he was all alone with his thoughts and memories, he understood a little better why his sister never wanted to be sober. He remembered how peaceful Niranye looked as she slept, when he got ready to leave in the hour before dawn; her bare shoulders had a dark, healthy glow in the dying embers of last night's fire, and she had seemed to radiate warmth, even from where he stood. He'd struggled mightily against the urge to take off his armor and snuggle up with her under the bearskins, and when that bitter Eastmarch wind greeted him with an icy slap in the face, he almost wanted to cry.

Thavrin ran a hand over his tied-back hair and stood. No time to cry, no time to feel sorry for himself. He had a job to finish, and more was riding on this than Guild business.

#

Mirriam woke up around sundown, and felt no better than she had when she'd first lain down. She glanced around, and noticed something that had the capacity to make her feel a little better.

The comely redhead from earlier was standing in the doorway of her tiny room. Every inch of him screamed "naïve farm-boy," and if there was anything Mirriam loved more than morally ambiguous city-slickers, it was nubile naïfs who were just begging for someone like her to show them a good time. She propped herself up in bed and gave him a lopsided grin. "Hey, how long've you been standing there, kid?"

"Oh, uhh, I just wanted to tell you that I saw your fight earlier, and it was the most amazing thing I've ever seen! I bet you've been all sorts of places…"

Mirriam snickered and took a drink from a half-empty mead bottle on her nightstand, trying to remember if she'd been the one to put it there. "Sure. Might say I've been all over."

"Where're you from?" The redhead pulled up a chair next to her bed and hunkered down for story-time, clearly more interested in her adventures than in anything Mirriam had in mind. She thought of shooing him away and taking another shot at getting some decent sleep, but then thought better of it.

"Me? I'm from Cyrodiil—lived on the edge of the Great Forest not too far from Bravil. Name's Mirriam." Mirriam stuck out her hand to shake. "And you are…?"

"Erik." He took her hand and shook it heartily. "Erik the Slayer, if I ever get out of Rorikstead."

"'The Slayer,' huh?"

"Yeah, I've always wanted to be an adventurer! How'd you end up in this backwater?"

"It's a nice enough place, kid. No bigger than where I grew up."

"What's it like in Cyrodiil? Did you ever see the capital?"

"Of course. I lived about half a day's walk from it when I was young—in a little village that sprung up around the Inn of Ill Omen during the Great War. Hell of a name for a place that didn't get leveled during the War."

"Sounds like an exciting place!"

"Eh. The patrons were shady enough, and that's where you'd go to find skooma, so I guess so. My old man worked as a forester after the war—saved up money, brought his lady over from Valenwood, and then raised himself a little family."

"Valenwood? Are you a half-elf?" He peered at her more closely then, looking for something obvious like pointed ears or pronounced cheekbones.

"Nah, just a Breton. I was adopted when I was a baby. Dad found me at a little roadside shrine one night in his travels." Mirriam smiled fondly as she remembered those younger days, back when her parents were still alive and kicking. "He raised me right alongside my big brother Thavrin, taught me to hunt and use a sword—Mom taught us how to read, and how to throw a punch."

"What's it like, being raised by Wood Elves?"

Mirriam thought about it, and decided he might not want to hear about Uncle Rudhin's funeral; or about the heart-rending letters her mother would receive from the motherland, filled with tales of how the Aldmeri Dominion was wrecking her homeland; or about the nights when her old man would wait until he thought they were all asleep before going outside to drink and weep on the front porch. She also decided to save the story of how she became an orphan again for another day. "It was normal, I guess. Not like we were living in a tree-house and swinging on vines. Mom was real big about us eating fresh vegetables and stuff; I guess it was like a novelty for her and Dad—they got real excited when tomatoes were in season and all that. Mom would make us do homework, like city-kids. I learned to climb trees right around the time I started walking, so there's that I guess. Why all the questions, anyway?"

Erik looked down at his hands and shrugged. "Oh, well, I just wanted to know how you got to be an adventurer is all. Sounds like your parents would've supported you…"

"I guess. They weren't really around for—ehh…" Mirriam sat up and changed the subject. "What, your old man won't let you leave the farm or something?"

Erik pursed his lips, still not looking up. "He says it's too dangerous, what with how this war's on and all. Besides, we don't have the money for decent armor."

"Oh. Well, what if I talk to him?"

Erik's head shot up, his tone considerably brighter now. "You'd do that?"

"Sure." Mirriam regretted saying anything, especially when she looked into those bright blue eyes full of joy and excitement. The necessity her "adventurous" lifestyle might have hardened her heart towards such exuberance, and might have given it an almost disturbing veneer in her eyes. His earnest naivety was heartbreaking in a way, and after the tumultuous past two days she'd had, it grated on her nerves. Mirriam turned her head away from him as she got up and shoved her feet into her boots, wondering briefly if telling him she ripped them off a decapitated vampire would only encourage him. "Don't look at me like that—it's no big deal!"

Erik was standing by now, and he took her hand in his. "It really is, though. I can't thank you enough!"

Mirriam waved him away and ambled into the main room, where Mralki was still tending bar. "Who's your old man, anyway? Hope it ain't that Lemkil bastard, 'cause you definitely didn't get your looks from him."

"Nope. That's him over there."

Mirriam looked over her shoulder at Erik, and then looked to see where he was pointing. It was none other than the man behind the bar. "Ah. That guy."

"Yep, this guy." Mralki leaned on the bar and watched her carefully; Mirriam had the feeling he'd been watching them since Erik stepped in her room. "What were you two talkin' about in there?"

"We were talking about her adventures, and she said she wants to help me!" Erik placed his hand on Mirriam's shoulder and grinned. He stood a whole head taller than her, and this only made her feel years older somehow.

Mralki narrowed his eyes at her. "That so? Why're you fillin' my boy's head with all this nonsense? Don't you know there's a war on?"

Mirriam cleared her throat. "Yes, I'm fully aware of that. I've been in two sieges myself, in fact. Thing is, your son is… uhh…" Mirriam glanced over her shoulder at Erik. "How old are you?"

"Seventeen."

Mirriam raised her eyebrows and nodded. "Wow… congratulations on the beard. Anyway," she turned back to Mralki and continued, "if your son's old enough to grow those magnificent whiskers, then he's old enough to make his own decisions, don't you think?"

"He's had a beard since he was twelve."

"Oh… w-well… sheesh, guess they were right about you Nords," she muttered. "A-anyway, he's a big kid now. Look at him! He's full-grown!"

"He's been that height for four years now."

"What?! Get out!" Mirriam peered up at Erik again, and then shook her head and turned back to Mralki. "Look. All this is a waste of time! Point is, he's at an age where he can make his own decisions, right?!"

"I s'pose so," Mralki said carefully, "but even if I let him go out there, I don't have enough money t'get him a decent set of armor. What kinda father would I be if I sent him out there with no armor?"

"Not a problem! Lemme just peel off a few septims here…" Mirriam reached into her bulging coin purse and set down two fistfuls of coins on the counter. "This should be enough to get him started, alright?"

Erik and his father gaped at the piles of money, speechless. Neither of them had ever seen so much money in one place in their lives, and it showed.

"One of the perks of adventuring," she said. _And knowing how to transmute metal._

"Well I'll be damned," Mralki whispered. "Alright, I'll get the boy some armor when I go in'ta town. Erik, you bring home plen'y of gold like this young woman here!"

Erik laughed and picked up Mirriam in a spine-popping hug. Something about her height made people think it was okay to pick her up like luggage—an assumption that usually cost them their lives.

Not tonight, though. Mirriam grimaced and patted his arm. "Don't mention it," she gasped, "really."

"I can't wait to get out there!" He said, putting her down with a grin. "Just you wait—I'll have plenty of stories to share with you and Pa over a mug of mead. This is gonna be great!"

#

Thavrin crouched on the thin ledge and stared down at the doorway, bowstring taught, black arrow dipped in paralysis poison. The mark was pacing the hall, nervous, or perhaps just feeling pent up and restless. It didn't matter, because ten seconds and two arrows later, he was dead. Thavrin leapt down onto the stairwell and landed softly, and raised his bow to take out the Altmer at the end of the hall, the one who still sat in his chair, unaware that his comrade laid dead only a few feet away. This arrow was well-placed, piercing his head and killing him in a single shot.

He smiled and slipped into the shadows of the poorly-lit hall, peeking around a corner to see who was in the next room. No one, but in the adjacent room he heard someone humming to himself—his next victim. Thavrin licked his lips and pulled an invisibility potion from his knapsack. He downed it and slipped his dagger from its sheath, crept into the room, clamped one hand over the Altmer's mouth and plunged the blade into his heart. He held on, savoring the startled gasp of his victim, the feeling of the body thrashing and then going limp and slumping back against him—a small and pleasant dose of warmth in those cold, damp halls.

Slowly, he let the body fall to the floor, and when he turned around he saw another Altmer, this one thankfully still asleep. He crouched down and drew near, lifted the blade, and sunk it deep into the sleeping mer's chest over and over until it started to come apart. Thavrin's stomach was growling already; he dug in and ate his fill of the broken body, and then he took a minute to listen. For a long time, he heard nothing, but then someone beyond the common room cleared his throat. Thavrin licked his fingers and took up his bow, and he sneaked out into the common room and took his place behind the Summerset Shadows' pitiful red banner. He peeked around the edge of it and saw his mark—another Altmer, one with an ebony sword and cheap knock-off armor that looked an awful lot like his own Guild armor back home in Riften. Thavrin smiled, and for a moment considered having a little fun with him in a melee battle—perhaps testing out a few poisons on him, sapping the strength from his bones and then bleeding him dry, or paralyzing him and watching the look on his face as he broke him apart limb-by-limb with a mace. He decided against it, though; not now, not when he was there on business.

The first arrow staggered Linwe, sending him out of his chair and out of balance. As he righted himself, a second arrow sank into his back, right next to his spine and between two ribs, tearing a hole in his lung. By now Linwe had spotted his assailant, the sallow Bosmer with glistening black eyes and a wide grin, and he received the final blow right through his heart.

Thavrin looted his corpse and then picked it clean, wrapping bloody chunks of meat in paper for the long trip to Solitude. While he plucked a few dried herbs from the drying rack in the stairwell, he thought he heard a familiar voice. His blood froze; he paused and held his breath, listening for a whole minute. Nothing, no voice, not until he'd relaxed and mounted the steps into the ice cavern. It seemed to mock him, a sly whisper that bounced off the slippery blue walls and congealed into a frosty ball of nausea in the pit of Thavrin's stomach. He unlatched his mace and, gripping it in his cold-numbed, white-knuckled hand, he pursued the voice down the hall and out into the empty valley, where wind and whirling snow carried away the sound and drowned it in its own empty keen.

#

Mirriam knew there was a reason she never visited Rorikstead sober. She wanted out of there, fast, and left almost immediately after dumping the septims on the counter. _Maybe they'll chalk it up to modesty. Who cares?_

She jogged up the hill, hiking her knapsack up on her shoulder, aimless as she tried to decide where to go next. Thavrin wouldn't be in Solitude for two or three days, and she was a day's march away from there by her estimate. She thought of stopping by Morthal, and hitting up Falion to see if he could give her some advice about her recent troubles. _I bet he's dealt with Sheogorath… maybe. Or maybe he's too smart to even look at that fetcher…_ Mirriam sighed and fished a skooma vial out of her belt pouch, downed it, and chucked the bottle over her shoulder. _Nothing, not even tingly fingers. These dumb Nords are getting gouged for this shit?! Wish I had the real—_

That stopped her dead in her tracks. Mirriam's grip on her knapsack strap tightened, and she gritted her teeth. Dervenin! "That dirty little fetcher…" She pounded her fist into the palm of her hand and growled. "When I find you, I'm gonna—"

The ground shook beneath her feet. The breeze kicked up. A shadow passed over her and was gone in an instant. By the time Mirriam's brain put all the stimuli together, she heard that too-familiar roar. Her ears perked up, and she mouthed the words almost thoughtlessly as they were said: "_Yor_… _Toor Shul_… oh no…"

Mirriam glanced over her shoulder, and her fears were confirmed as the warm air drifted past her, lifting up dirty loose strands of hair around her face. "Shit…" Without wasting another moment, Mirriam sprinted back down the hill to the little burning village of Rorikstead, flinging fireballs at the dragon as it sailed overhead and roared. "Get back here and fight a _real_ man, you fetcher!" Mirriam summoned up a thunderbolt and flung it skyward, catching the tail of her opponent as it circled around to descend on the village once again. One guard was down, and the other had her bow out. She closed in on the dragon as it landed, firing little steel arrows that did little more than draw the dragon's ire.

"_Stand down, dammit!_" Mirriam cast a volley of thunderbolts at the creature, hoping to wear down its magicka reserves and spare the village from going up in flames completely. Her plan worked a little too well; the dragon snapped up the guard, gave her a good shake, and flung her lifeless body across the field before taking off again. "_Shit!_"

"Where is he?!" Erik came running up to her, woodcutting axe in hand, face shining with sweat and smudged with smoke and soot.

"Now's not the time for games. Get out of here!" Mirriam braced herself and Erik as the dragon landed before them, and roughly shoved Erik as far from them as she could before taking a deep breath and shouting, "_Fus ro dah!_" The dragon recoiled and snarled, and Mirriam leapt on it and hacked away with Dawnbreaker. "_Run, Erik!_"

He didn't run. He didn't even stand. He watched, mouth gaping, as Mirriam tore the dragon's face up with her sword, slashing and stabbing at it like it was the embodiment of everything she hated and feared. The creature roared and tried to shake her loose, and failing that, bellowed in agony as white-hot flames danced across its crackling, blistering skin. The light illuminated Mirriam's features in the cold, dark night, and she looked to Erik like a creature of Oblivion. Her lips were twisted in a hateful snarl, and her brown eyes, framed in black war paint, glowed with hellish pent-up wrath, the wrath of someone who hadn't yet had her fill of blood and vengeance. As Mirriam hopped down and consumed its soul, Erik realized he'd been holding his breath, and that he hadn't blinked in a long time.

As the hiss of dissolving dragon flesh died down, Mirriam wiped her blade on the goat-hide tassets of her armor and sheathed it. For a while all was calm as the night-sounds of the prairie took over once again, but then a child's scream cut through the night air.

One of Lemkil's girls was rooted to the spot where Rorik lie dead, his body half-burned and smoldering. Her sister came out of from her hiding place behind one of the farmhouses and, when she saw what had frightened her sister, took her hand tearfully. The two of them huddled together by the road and wept in each other's arms.

Erik was speechless as he stood over Rorik's body. Hands shaking, he knelt down and closed the old man's eyes. He bowed his head, trying to hide his own tears, but the shudder gave him away.

Mirriam watched him in silence, unsure of what to say. She was right, but she didn't want to be right. The boy had no idea what kind of "stories" adventurers like her really had to share with each other, or what they held in their hearts over the long, weather-beaten years. All her life she'd gone days at a time in the wilderness without a friend beside her, sleeping on her back on the cold ground, trying to catch some rest before the next enemy came her way; all her life she lived this way, and even if Thavrin was asleep beside her in some old Ayleid ruin, in the end she had to face her ghosts alone. Erik looked like he needed a hug and a warm blanket, like he could never live that life. She knew that he could, and that he would, and that next time she saw him he'd be like her, that the lightness and joy would be gone. One day he'd come home to Rorikstead, and his father would barely recognize his boy.

Erik looked up at her, almost pleadingly, though both of them knew there was nothing to be done. Mirriam didn't say a word, didn't even nod; she turned and headed down the road into the wild fields under the dim light of Masser. She was far better than him at hiding her tears.

#

Thavrin walked up and placed the armor on Niranye's counter without a word, and gave her a shy smile. "Here. I wiped most of the blood off."

It took her a second, but when she recognized whose armor it was, Niranye gasped and withdrew her hand. "So… so he's…"

"Yep, Linwe and his whole crew are dead. You'll never have to deal with them again."

Niranye leaned over the counter, seized Thavrin by his shoulders, and gave him a firm kiss on the lips, unmindful of the stuffy, dour Nords around her. It took him by surprise, not that he was complaining, and he barely heard her as she thanked him profusely for taking care of her problem. When he finally tuned back in, he heard her ask, "So will you be staying another night? Thavrin?"

"Oh…" his heart sank. "I wish I could, but I have to meet my sister in Solitude. I have a long road ahead of me, and one more stop to make before I get there." He pushed all of the words out as fast as he could without sounding hopped up, trying to counter the reluctance that set upon him. He hated Windhelm, but he also hated to leave so soon.

"I see." Niranye looked down at the armor on her counter and ran a finger across the crude stitching. "Will you be back? When will I see you again?"

Thavrin reached out and placed his hand on hers. "Soon, Niranye. I'll be back this way in about a week. You'll be the first person I visit, and I'll stay a little longer. Mirriam can go ahead to Winterhold without me, and I'll wait with you while she does business with the college." Thavrin felt a little empty on the inside, even though he knew he'd see her again. He hadn't expected it to be so difficult to say goodbye—things were worse than he'd thought.

Niranye nodded and kissed his hand gently. "Hurry back."

Thavrin swallowed and nodded, holding her hand a moment longer before leaving. He wrapped his cloak around his shoulders and leaned against the wind as he walked down the stone bridge and made tracks to Wayward Pass, the fastest way he knew of to get to Dawnstar from there.

###


	6. Black Vomit

_**Black Vomit**_

_"Above it stood the seraphims: each one had six wings; with twain he covered his face, and with twain he covered his feet, and with twain he did fly._

_And one cried unto another, and said, Holy, holy, holy, is the Lord of hosts: the whole earth is full of his glory._

_And the posts of the door moved at the voice of him that cried, and the house was filled with smoke."_

_Isaiah 6:2-4 (KJV)_

* * *

Mirriam had a lot on her mind, and she didn't want to deal with Sheogorath's stupid followers that day.

That wasn't entirely true: she only wanted to deal with one of his followers, namely the one who had all of her sap now and had probably done something foolish in the process of getting it, like knocking the spigot out of the tree and losing it in the tall grass. Her anger and frustration burned through everything else the more she thought about it, edging out her unease about Lemkil's girls, Erik's first big "adventure," the sad emptiness at her brother's absence, the aching in her head and her sides, the ever-present fatigue and unshakeable insomnia. Mirriam ground her teeth and ignored the screaming of the madwoman. It didn't even sound like words, and why was she flailing? Mirriam glanced back at her before she could stop herself, and caught a glimpse of some movement in the brush.

A gray-cloaked figure was pursuing the woman, silent and swift like a ghost in the marsh, and the madwoman, Mirriam realized, was screaming for help. Her eyes were wide, not with madness, but with terror. The pursuant stopped and lifted something to its concealed mouth, and the madwoman collapsed.

She had no time to weigh her options or to think about whether she wanted to get involved. She didn't even know if the woman could still be saved. The cloaked figure drew a sword with its black-gloved hand and Mirriam drew hers, backing away to put some distance between them and the madwoman. The attacker drew near, and with her free hand Mirriam reached out and encased him in a bright wall of flame. The fire spread across the dry wool of the attacker's mantle, and he shrieked and flailed, batting at the flames ineffectually as they consumed him. Mirriam brought Dawnbreaker down across his knees and thrust it into his gut, and sent him crumpling into a rasping, writhing heap on the mossy stone and arid soil beneath them. She stood over him and, as the flames finally died away, sank the blade into his heart one more time just to make sure he stayed down, and carefully peeled back the charred cloak to look for some kind of identification. Smoky flesh came away with the wool in large, crumbling flakes. In her haste and violence, Mirriam had burnt away most of the features of his face—his lips were gone, and his eyes sunken and concealed in melted, blackened eyelids. There were no amulets, no jewelry, not even money, and whatever use his clothing might have been—distinctive stitching or symbols—was now lost to flame and smoke.

"Shit." Mirriam shook her head in disgust and stood. The burnt hair and fabric smell stung her nostrils; she snorted and wiped the sweat from her brow, and inspected the madwoman. She was still breathing; a small dart was in her neck, undoubtedly tipped with poison. Mirriam had heard of blow-darts before from her mother. They were used by some assassins, and also in guerilla warfare in Valenwood and Elseweyr, though they saw little use in any other parts of Tamriel. Mirriam carefully removed it and was about to throw it away, but decided better of it and dropped the dart into an empty potion bottle.

She turned the woman over onto her back and patted her cheek. There was no response, and her skin had the warmth and texture of a dead, plucked chicken. Mirriam cringed and withdrew her hand. "Lady? Hey lady, wake up. C'mon!" She tried shaking her, and then patted her cheek a little harder. "Gods…" Mirriam looked around her and saw that there was no one else—no attackers, but no one she could leave the woman with. She sighed and tried administering a poison-curing potion; most of it dribbled back out of the woman's mouth, and what little that made it down her throat seemed to have no effect. Mirriam ran her hand over her head and glanced up at the sky, as if the answer was going to be written up there, and then flopped down on her back and groaned in frustration. "Just get up, lady. I can't leave you like this!"

Mirriam sat up. No, maybe she couldn't leave her like that, but maybe they didn't have to stay there, either. _Ha ha, good thinking, Mirriam!_ She hoisted the frail, weather-beaten old lady onto her shoulders and hiked on towards Morthal, where Falion and Lami might be able to find a remedy between the two of them. _Assuming those two can actually work together…_

This bright idea worked for about five minutes before her stamina gave out. Mirriam collapsed, and gasped for breath as she crawled out from beneath the dead weight of the woman's limp body. She almost regretted all the skooma and alcohol she'd put into her body for all those years, and then she remembered that she still had a few vials of the watery stuff. She sat down and threw them back one by one, tossing the empties over her shoulder carelessly. It brought her back from the brink of fatigue, but did little else except to ensure that she'd be too restless to lie down that night.

"Wouldn't be a problem if I had a fetchin' bottle of sap," she grumbled, to no one in particular. Mirriam turned to the old woman, who was now face-down in a patch of blue mountain flowers. "Ugh. Get it together!" She rolled the woman onto her back, and realized that she probably wasn't that old.

The madwoman was worn and weary, a dead body animated by an alien force that robbed her of her personality, her friends and family, and her future. Who would let a madwoman stay in their inn, or in their homes where their little children slept? People like her were common in the wilderness. Mirriam and Thavrin had come across them many times in their life among the vagrants and bandits—withered men and women with wide eyes and filthy hair, caked in mud, hands stained with their own or other people's blood. Sometimes they were running scared, sometimes they were wild like rabid wolves, and sometimes they were completely dead on the outside, sitting and staring, insensible to all outside stimulus. They died violently sometimes—they were easy marks for crooks, and the fear they caused with their odd speech and behavior could sometimes sweep 'sane' villagers into frenzy. Most of the time they starved, though, or died of exposure. They had no protector, not once the priests in the cities became overwhelmed, or just disgusted, and turned them out of the convents and temples; and what could you expect from a Daedra, anyway? Even one who was supposed to be your lord and master? Sheogorath didn't give a damn about social contracts.

A fox ran past, stirring Mirriam from her thoughts. How was she going to move this woman? She'd done a lot of bad things in her life, but the idea of leaving someone prone in the wild made her uneasy. Mirriam tried a healing spell, which did nothing. The woman obviously wasn't accepting potions in her condition. Finally, she looked at her staff, Wabbajack.

It had healing properties. Sometimes. Other times, it would blow people up, or mutate them, or render them incorporeal, reducing them to a pile of gelatinous goo and, for whatever reason, a stack of coins. Still, it was better than nothing. _At least she'll be out of her misery if she blows up…_

She sighed and stood up, brushed herself off, and aimed the staff at her. A wave of warm light enveloped her, and the woman sat up and yawned as though she'd woken up from a deep sleep. When she saw Mirriam and the Wabbajack, her face brightened; she hopped to her feet and assaulted Mirriam with a jittery, awkward hug. "You saved me! Sheogorath has blessed us both! Please, ma'am, let me be blessed one more time!"

Mirriam backed away as the woman leapt up and clutched at her arm. "Okay, okay. Here," Mirriam shooed her away a few feet and passed the Daedric artifact over the madwoman, who transformed into a rabbit in a burst of red light. The rabbit sniffed at the air and hopped off gleefully, and Mirriam sprinted away in the other direction so that she wouldn't have to deal with her once she turned back.

_Glad that's over._ Mirriam ran past Rannveig's Fast to South Cold Rock Pass. A skeleton was waiting with its ancient bow and rusted arrows. Mirriam didn't give it the time of day as she mounted the steps, and as the arrows fell, more than flew, past her head and clicked uselessly against the old, worn stone, she wondered if the attack on the madwoman was an isolated case. The weaponry used was too out-of-place, the man too oddly dressed to be a run-of-the-mill bandit. Did it have something to do with the Mad God's enemy? _Why in Oblivion are they picking on wanderers?_ Whoever was behind this, Mirriam decided that they must be very cruel and petty. _A Daedric Prince, in other words._ She sneered, and braced herself as she entered the icy cavern on her way to Morthal. _Too bad I burnt that sucker. He had a nice cloak; I need a thing like that in Skyrim…_

#

Thavrin's stomach was twisted in knots. He wanted to puke, but there was nothing left in his stomach. Even when he killed those three frost trolls outside of the temple, all of the tension was still there. He swallowed and grasped the door handle, and hesitated. No one would be behind that door. It was a ruin full of dead men. The townies were too cowardly to come up here—they all knew it was cursed.

"Nothing to fear." Thavrin licked his lips and opened the door.

Dust motes floated in the air. Ferns sprouted up and unfurled all around the rubble and smashed pews. There was just enough light for Thavrin to see where he was going, some of it radiating from the shimmering image of the Weaver of the Panoply in all her violet glory, some of it from gaping holes in the crumbling roof. Thavrin inspected the little shrine on the side of the room and lit the votive candles in silence, and placed a few sprigs of lavender on the table. He thought that asphodel and peonies might have been more fitting, but there were none to be had in this cold province.

"You're late."

Thavrin jumped, nearly knocking over the table. It couldn't be… that voice was too familiar. Thavrin was too afraid to turn around and see who was talking. He gripped the edge of the table and stared down at the votives. He felt the hairs on the back of his neck stiffen. He was about to empty all of the bile and sickness in him onto that shrine.

"I knew you'd come back eventually, boy, but I didn't think you'd keep me waiting this long…"

"You're dead."

His laughter was bitter and harsh. There was no warmth, no love. He didn't raise his voice. Perhaps he could sense that he didn't have to. "I'm _supposed_ to be dead. Isn't that right?"

Thavrin finally gathered the courage to look over his shoulder. He hoped to see a ghost or an impostor—anything, anything but the man himself, sitting calmly on one of the pews under the cool light that filtered through the holes and the rafters above. He had his back to Thavrin, and the golden hood of his priest's robe was up, and between his feet in their well-worn leather boots, a puddle of blood dribbled down onto the uneven stone floor.

"Do you think this is the reunion I wanted, Thavrin? Do you think this is what I would have chosen for myself?"

The Dunmer turned to look at him, and Thavrin, in his shame and fear, averted his gaze.

"What a coward you are," he whispered. "You've grown weak. Thavrin, why won't you look at your sweetest friend?"

Thavrin was already out of there. He burst through the old wooden door and didn't stop running until he was halfway through the Pale, praying to whoever was listening that he could outrun a dead Dunmer.

#

Agni and the other children were running all over town, chasing dragonflies and each other, laughing and carrying on as if this was the first warm, sunny day they've ever known. Mirriam sat with Falion on the balcony of his house, sipping mugs of hot mead and keeping a wary eye on the swamp as they talked.

"A blow-dart, hm?" Falion leaned back against one of the pillars as he spoke, and held the dart up to the light. "I'm not an alchemist by trade, and I can't think of who would use such a weapon, but I'll look into it."

"Thanks, Falion."

"And where did this happen?"

"Just over that mountain, in broad daylight. Whoever was after her, he didn't seem as worried about me."

"Hm. Well, I'd take a scraping of this residue to Lami, see what she has to say about it—though I doubt she has much experience with toxins."

"Yeah… Y'know, lemme see that dart. I know just the person to bring this to!" Mirriam took the dart and placed it back in its bottle. "Anyway, he was after this madwoman for some reason. I can't figure it out—I doubt she had any septims on her. He didn't look like your typical bandit—didn't fight like one, either. He was pretty weak, like he didn't quite know what he was doing."

"These are difficult times. Everyone's scared, and there are people who think the world is coming to an end. It's been that way since the Great War. New cults are cropping up all over; some wish to prevent the world's end, some wish to hasten it, and others just want a front-row seat. Did you know there's a revival of sorts going on among the Talos cult? A few of them are breaking off and reviving the old worship of Shezarr—Shor in the Nord language."

"Shor? I hear that name all the time around here."

"He's a significant part of their heritage, but lately his name and image are being associated with anti-mer sentiments—something you and your brother might worry about."

Mirriam frowned, trying to reconcile the many texts she'd read in Winterhold and at the Bard's College. "Wait, wasn't that kind of his thing in the first place? Like, before St. Alessia's time?"

Falion shrugged. "So it's written. In the end it doesn't matter; the masses will heed whichever priest can tell them the things they want to hear—like affirmations of their prejudice and fear. It's been that way since the beginning of recorded history. Nationalism and religion too often go hand-in-hand."

"I guess…" Mirriam emptied her tankard and crossed her legs. "Y'know, I don't want to deal with this. I keep saying that, but I really am getting tired. Last thing I need is _another_ group of idiots skippin' around in robes and killin' random peasants. Don't we have enough of that with the Thalmor and stuff? I'm too tired for this shit!"

Falion raised one eyebrow, his face half-hidden by his tankard as he took another sip. "How are you, by the way? You look as though you haven't slept in days."

Mirriam narrowed her eyes and studied him. "Restless as ever…" _Why do you ask?_

"Hm. Well, I guess there's always your sleeping tree sap, right?"

"Nope." Mirriam crossed her arms and glared across the pond at a lone mudcrab, and tried not to think about what they looked like when they were being smashed apart and eaten raw.

"No? What happened? Did someone take your sap?"

"That's what I wanted to talk to you about, actually. I'm having Daedra problems, see—"

"Shh! Not so loud!" Falion glanced around them to make sure no one was listening, and then waved her inside the house. Not until he locked the door and double-checked his wards did he allow Mirriam to continue. "You were saying?"

"I was saying," Mirriam continued with some annoyance, "that there's a Daedric Prince running around on the living world, and he thinks I should help him with his dumb problems. Damned if I can talk him out of it—he thinks I should lead his 'army' against his 'enemy,' and frankly, I don't think he even has an army! Moreover, I think he had one of his stupid followers nick all my sap. I nearly got my arse handed to me by a pack of mammoths and giants yesterday, and now I have _nothing_ to show for it!"

Falion took a seat on his bed, clutching the sides of his head. "Oh gods, just slow down! Back up! Did you say a _Daedric Prince_ is here in Skyrim? Which one? Where exactly was he?"

Mirriam straddled the chair in the corner as she elaborated. "It was Sheogorath. Last I saw him was near Valtheim Keep out in Whiterun, but gods know where he is now. We had a good, long chat that mostly was him wasting his breath, and he ate a fetching mudcrab. _Uncooked._ It was disgusting! He just smashed it into a boulder until it didn't even look like a—"

"Mirriam! Focus!" Falion stood up and began pacing. "What did he want with you? What were his orders?"

"Well," Mirriam scratched the back of her head as she thought back to all the mindless rambling that had taken place, and after a minute she cobbled together something resembling a coherent memory of all that blather. "He wanted me to lead his army on Mt… Kilkreath? And he said something about… uhh… meeting a 'mutual friend' on the way to Solitude." Mirriam paused and looked up at Falion. "Was he talking about you?"

Falion huffed and crossed his arms. "Now you sound like those ignorant villagers."

"Just thought I'd ask," she mumbled.

Falion ignored her and looked through his book collection. "Off the top of my head, I can't think of what kind of terrestrial army he would have. If he's thinking of transporting a great number of Daedra to assist him, however… well, I think you know that we're both obligated to put a stop to that."

"But how?!" Mirriam whined. "I don't even know who he's fighting, or why he's doing it! He might've even forgotten by n—"

"Shhhshshshhh…" Falion put a finger up in front of her face. "I'm not done. What I was going to say is that it doesn't seem likely. He's not a militant Daedric Prince—usually. Maybe someone or something has incurred his wrath in a way that we haven't witnessed in entire Eras. Maybe there's some sort of perceived grievance, and you're expected to play along in his demented game of pretend. Who can say?"

Mirriam chewed on her lip as she studied the floorboards. "Hey… do you know a Dervenin, by any chance?"

"Dervenin? I… might have heard of him…" Falion glanced to the side and coughed.

Mirriam shot him a mean look. "Don't give me that. You're Mister Oblivion Expert—I get it. I'm impressed, even, and I promise I won't repeat anything to the other hayseeds, so can we just drop the charade?"

Falion watched her for a moment, and then spoke quietly. "Alright. What about Dervenin?"

"Who exactly is he? He was on speaking terms with Sheogorath, and he seems to have some magical properties, and more importantly, the little fetcher made off with _my_ sap, and he's probably wasted it all by now! I mean how's a girl supposed to sleep at night if she can't have fetchin'—"

"Mirriam! If you mention your thrice-damned sap _one more time_, I _swear_ I'll dump you in the pond without another word! Focus!"

"Hmph."

Falion sighed and rolled his eyes. "I'll give you a recipe for a sleeping draught before you leave, alright?"

"I thought you said you weren't an alchemist."

Falion's eye twitched. "Look, that's not—that's not the—_we're wasting time, Mirriam!_" There was a knock on the door. The both of them ignored it at first, and then Falion threw his arms up and wrenched the door open. "_What?!_"

It was Agni, the dark-haired orphan that he'd taken under his wing some years ago. There were tears in her big, brown eyes, and her skirt was streaked with fresh mud and grass-stains. "I skinned my knee!"

Falion's shoulders slumped, and he seemed to deflate as he let out a long sigh as he led her inside. "Oh… Come in; let's take a look at it."

Mirriam stood and offered the little girl her seat, and gave her a boiled cream treat she'd bought at the inn earlier. "Here, kid. Eating helps you grow stronger."

"Thanks!" This seemed to take Agni's mind off her scraped knee for the most part while Falion cleaned it with a damp piece of flour-sack, but Mirriam knew that there would be no more talk about Daedra and cults.

"I'll be back in town in a couple of days. I guess we'll pick up where we left off…"

"Hmm. Wait a minute." Falion grabbed a scrap of parchment and scribbled something onto it. "Here—this is the recipe I was talking about. Drink it in boiled water, like a tea."

"Alright. Thanks." Mirriam shouldered her knapsack and tucked the recipe into a pouch on her belt as she headed for the door.

"I'll do some research in the meantime. _You_ stay out of trouble." Falion lifted Agni in his arms as he fixed Mirriam with a stern look. "Don't talk to anyone you shouldn't talk to."

"Like strangers?" Agni asked, wrapping one arm around Falion's neck as she munched on her pastry.

Falion sighed and smiled, shifting her into a more comfortable position in the crook of his arm. "Not you, child."

#

Thavrin sat curled up, hugging his knees to his chest on a burnt bed in a burnt house. The roof was gone. Charred and half-eaten remains lay strewn about in a black splotch on the splintered floorboards. An inch of ash covered every surface, and on top of that an inch of grey snow. It looked like a ritual gone wrong or a dragon attack, but Thavrin didn't pay enough attention to figure out which one it was. His face was pressed into his knees; his eyes were squeezed shut so that the tears had to come out a little at a time, and so that he couldn't see anyone or anything. He would hold each breath at first, listening to the howling wind for that cold voice of the dead, for footsteps of one who hadn't walked for weeks, footsteps that carried a body long cold and buried under a mound of stones outside Nightcaller Temple.

In spite of what it all meant, Thavrin caught himself wishing to hear that voice again, and when he realized this, he felt sick once more, though the bile could not drown the flicker of longing that he felt against all reason.

He whimpered, and clenched and unclenched his fists against the knees of his trousers with frozen, numb fingers. How could he be going crazy? The Mad God had called his sister, not him, and he had never touched a drop of skooma in his life. Thavrin corrected himself immediately; Mirriam wasn't crazy. She was a victim, she'd been abused by powers beyond her control, and she was just having a rough time with her addiction. She wasn't beyond help, and _he_ was not going crazy.

Thavrin sniffled and sat up, wiping his nose on the back of his leather glove, and he searched his knapsack for the last red apple. It was the consequence of eating nothing but raw flesh all day, Thavrin decided; he needed a better diet was all.

Thavrin tore into the apple and ate it, seeds and all, oblivious to the loud crunching and the sticky juices that dribbled from his lips and seeped into his depths of his perfectly-maintained beard. He took a swig of ale, letting the warmth spread through his limbs as far as it could reach. It never did reach his hands; his fingers ached in that wretched cold, and he found himself thinking of how nice it would be to place them in the hands of another, someone warm and soft and real. He and Mirriam were long past the age where they could cuddle together for warmth, and he had no one to turn to in his travels—just one woman in one city, one who would never deign to leave the walls. Thavrin's eyes stung, though the icy wind had died for a moment; he gulped down the last of the ale and when that didn't help rein in the welling of emotion, he flung the bottle away. It smashed against the wall, leaving little wet splotches in the new snow. Thavrin gave in. He put his face down into his knees again and allowed himself exactly one minute to cry.

After that failed to relieve his frustration, Thavrin stood and wiped the freezing tears away. He regretted setting foot in this province, he regretted letting those soldiers take him and Mirriam alive, and he regretted agreeing to hold up that stupid courier who'd gotten them into this whole mess. He regretted ever lifting a finger to help the Jarl of Whiterun, letting Mirriam go out there and absorb dragon souls, letting Mirriam go. He'd given due respect to the gods all his life, and now they repaid him by springing to life in the worst way possible and taking away what was left of his family. He wanted to crawl back to Windhelm, to tell Ulfric to suck his Aldmeri dick, and to curl up and die on Niranye's hearth. None of those things were an option, though. He had a job to do, and a promise to keep.

On the howling wind, the sound of fighting reached his ears: steel on steel; heavy, shifting footfalls in loose, wet snow; three angry voices mingled and lost on the dead, stark walls of the foothills. A small skirmish, but a convenient distraction from his misery. Thavrin slipped down into the bushes and followed his ears through the falling snow, bow in hand and arrow notched.

"Who to kill…" he whispered.

One of them was dead already, and it was two against one. Two Vigilants of Stendarr were squared off against a desperate and woefully under-prepared vampire, a fledgling who went unarmored into the wilderness and somehow thought that it would go well with him in a world full of people that hated his kind. Thavrin sneered and lifted his bow, and finished him off from afar. The Vigilants paused and looked about them; they couldn't see who had aided them, so they put their maces away and walked on, undoubtedly chalking up their good fortune to Stendarr's grace. Thavrin's sneer turned into a grin. He notched another arrow, and decided to give them a lesson in theology.

#

Through the haze of insomnolent weariness, the headache, and the endless caravan of unwelcome thoughts, Mirriam noticed that all of the crickets and bugs had stopped chirping. When she was a child, her mother had told her that they stopped when a ghost was passing by, and when she was a child, she believed it. Now, Mirriam had no idea what had silenced them, but she knew she had no intention of being caught by surprise, whatever it was. She crouched down among the deathbell and old brush by a smooth, primeval stone column, holding her breath as she listened and waited.

She was north of Morthal, near the edge of the marshlands. The sun was caught in the rampick tree line, and she was surprised to see that there were no deer, no foxes, no spiders, or trolls—nothing. Every bird and insect had stilled its wings and stifled its voice. A lone rabbit darted out across a shallow pool, fleeing, and didn't seem to notice her. The silence went on for a long time, too long for the forester's daughter's comfort.

Finally Mirriam spotted movement a few yards ahead of her—another grey-hooded stranger, silent, head bowed, hands clasped, it walked on without paying her any heed. That's when Mirriam smelled wood-smoke. _A forest fire? A camp?_ Nearly on all fours, Mirriam stalked the lone figure, careful not to step on any branches as she went along.

Soon she found out where it was going. She heard it before she saw it—chanting, low and monotone, a single syllable that meant nothing to her. The chanting came from two orderly groups of grey-cloaked people who kneeled on the ground on either side of a line of swords. The swords were arranged hilt-to-tip in a jagged line that resembled a serpent, one that ended at the feet of a crude wooden effigy. In one hand, upraised, the effigy clutched a flowering branch. In the other, held down, there was a live snake. It wound itself around the effigy's arm, its black tongue tasting the air as it blinked sleepily at the grey-cloaked cultists. The effigy's head was half-doused in fresh blood that hadn't quite congealed yet, and dripped down on the mossy stone below. The last grey-cloak arrived and stood at the end of the ophidian path of swords, laying down its own at the beginning with silence and reverence.

There was no question in her mind now. These were cultists; in no way did this resemble Temple-sanctioned behavior. Mirriam readied herself, prepared to send them all to their master, whomever that might be, if they turned on her. If any of the grey-cloaks knew of her presence, however, they didn't act upon it.

The one she'd been following pushed back its hood, and then unclasped its cloak, letting it fall to the ground. It was a woman, Mirriam could tell by the outline; either that or it was the most shapely and buxom man she'd ever encountered (and for a fleeting moment, Mirriam's thoughts wandered to what that might look like and whether she'd want to bed it).

The priestess was arrayed in all black beneath her cloak, her head concealed in a mask of sheer cloth. Her neck and wrists were decked in tarnished silver jewelry set with hoary, glittering stones like opaque crystals, and she wore a thick grey cord of braided silk around her hips. She stood tall and serene among the hooded cultists, whose voices were now raised in unintelligible, impenetrable might.

Their chant bored into Mirriam's head and obliterated all thought, all aberration, making smooth the plane of her mind. She lost herself in it. Her heart was calm, her eyes unfocused and heavy-lidded, her every movement in accord with the One Prime Objective. Unblinking, unthinking, Mirriam watched as the priestess walked the snake-path to the image of their enemy, the False Truth; the Left Hand; the Sundered Brother; the Spark; the Great Contradiction; the Giver and Taker of all that is young and new; the one whose ends are ruination, fraction, and perdition. The priestess whispered the name, the holy name, and bearing aloft a blazing torch, she touched it to the lips of the effigy, and from there sprung a wave of fire that engulfed the unbearable image. The priestess turned to her, and through the gloom Mirriam thought she could see through the cloth of the black mask to pale eyes like the winter's first snow clouds…

Mirriam didn't have long to study the priestess's eyes, however, because a single ringing note disrupted her chant, followed by the sound of someone calling her name. She thought it might have been her brother at first, though aged greatly. How long had she been under? Was it perhaps her father back from the dead?

"_To me, Isa! In our Lord's name!_" It was a Bosmer, but none whom she would call family. Dervenin summoned forth another being from Oblivion, one who looked like a glowing Altmer suited in golden chainmail. It struck down the nearest cultist with a cruel-looking flail and the others scattered into the swamp, priestess and all. In a single moment the spell was broken, and Mirriam was left up to her ankles in the cold mud before a messy line of swords and the smoldering remains of an effigy that reeked of burnt flesh.

Her first thought was a hazy sense of embarrassment, as though she'd been caught slacking off, and then her mind became clear as she focused in on Dervenin, and anger over stolen sap. "_You!_" Mirriam drew her sword, and she found herself standing toe-to-toe with the creature that, while not as tall as an Altmer, was still very imposing and by all appearances very much against the idea of Mirriam harming her summoner.

Mirriam was about to introduce the lady to Dawnbreaker when Dervenin expelled it to the nether-realms with a word.

"Tomorrow you will meet me at the foot of Mount Kilkreath," he said to Mirriam. "Our master commands us!"

Mirriam opened her mouth to reply, but he was on a roll now and there was no stopping him.

"You bear the sign of authority, and so you must lead his army to victory against the cultists! Together, you will tear them from their hiding place and expose them to the light of day—it is our master's bidding!"

"Hold on now, who? What army? Are you summoning more of those things? And where's my sap?!"

Dervenin didn't seem to understand her questions, or if he did, he ignored them completely. "We await your command! Let me show you where we're stationed…" Before Mirriam could stop him, Dervenin opened her knapsack, pulled out her map, and decorated it with a big, red X over Deepwood Vale—a place that, last Mirriam checked, was a swarming nest of rabid, homicidal Forsworn.

"You have got to be kidding me…"

Dervenin glared at her reproachfully as he folded the map and returned it to her knapsack. "I would _never_ kid about the Mad God's will, and neither should you!"

"Dervenin."

"Yes?"

"Give me my fetching sap."

Dervenin's expression was like that of a deer in the split second between espying the hunter and fleeing. "Your… your what?"

"My. Sap. You took it, and I want it back, you greasy little—"

"You can't!" Dervenin took a step back. "I need it! My master wills it—"

"The hell he does. Give it back you creep!" Mirriam made a grab for him, and he dodged.

"No!"

"_Dervenin, you piece of shit!_" Dawnbreaker flew ringing from its scabbard, and Mirriam set upon the little Bosmer as he tore shrieking across the swamp. She chased him to the edge of the sound, and lost him when he dove into the water. Mirriam was doubled over from the effort, and panted for breath. _Damn, he's fast._ By the time the air returned to her lungs, Mirriam had calmed somewhat. She pulled her last jug of wine from her knapsack and chugged it as she sat down on the rocky ledge next to a rotting stump. "I'll get you next time, fetcher," she said to no one as she wiped her mouth. After popping a couple vials of skooma, Mirriam was back in action, and fully prepared to swim the channel to the ancient and charming cliff-side city of Solitude.

###

* * *

**_Next Chapter: The dynamic duo meet up, fight, entertain some kids, lose friends and alienate people, and settle affairs. Everyone's favorite Lolrandumb god returns with a vengeance, and boy is he pissed off! What's his problem now? And Thavrin, what the hell is your deal? Are you on glue? Or maybe it was something you ate..._**


	7. Trinkets Pale of Moon

**_Trinkets Pale of Moon_**

_"[And it was during] these fits of anger and nonsense that Pelinal would fall into the Madness, where whole swaths of lands were devoured in divine rampage to become Void, and Alessia would have to pray to the Gods for their succor, and they would reach down as one mind and soothe the Whitestrake until he no longer had the will to kill the earth in whole. And Garid of the men-of-ge once saw such a Madness from afar and maneuvered, after it had abated, to drink together with Pelinal, and he asked what such an affliction felt like, to which Pelinal could only answer, 'Like when the dream no longer needs its dreamer.'"_

_Author Unknown, The Song of Pelinal, vol. 6: On His Madness_

* * *

Mirriam found them far from the cupreous path in Blackreach in a forest of thin-stemmed, phosphorescent mushrooms. Erandur's body was prone on the cold ground, naked to the waist and pallid, and his red eyes were wide-open and still. Thavrin knelt beside him; he placed one bloody, quivering hand upon the fatal wound. Bitter tears fell from his eyes and mingled with the blood; wracked with shuddering sobs, he tore at the wound with his bare hands, pulling back the blanching skin, snapping white ribs and shoveling handful after handful of steaming red gore into his mouth. He didn't even stop to close his beloved's eyes as he gorged himself through his tears, biting back his emotions, swallowing them with each piece of tender flesh, choking down gristle and tendon and everything else that passed his lips. The hot blood pooled around them, mixing with the soft, dark loam, and Thavrin's knees sank into the mud.

Her father stoked the fire in the hearth, and above it a cauldron full of deeply spiced blood boiled thickly, spattering his arm with searing-hot droplets; his kind, open face was now a grim mask of resolve, his eyes focused on something miles away from Cyrodiil and years before now. Mom closed her eyes and took a deep breath, placed both hands on the table to steady herself, one on either side of Uncle Rudhin's incruent bare feet, and her loose red hair fell around her face. She began the prayer to the great Spirit of The Now.

"_Great Y'ffre, we partake of the flesh of our brother in your honor, in your memory, in good faith, in remembrance of the Arrayal of all things…_"

Her words quickly ran together with her husband's into one continuous noise, one syllable, deafening and unstoppable, compelling in its mindless force. Thavrin was too consumed in his own grief and bottomless hunger to pray with them; he wept over the bare bones of his beloved when there was no more flesh to be had, and as the tears ran from his eyes he cast his eyes heavenward one last time, and then he bowed his head and withered like a starving prisoner, curling up as a dying ant curls around its mortal wound. Mirriam squeezed her eyes shut, but she could not remove herself from her surroundings, or from the presence of _the beloved dead, from the ones who strengthen us in their life and in ours, whose bones become ours, whose blood is ours, whose flesh_—Mirriam plugged her ears in vain, and the prayer defiantly dug its long white claws into her ears, the words savagely lodged themselves deeper into her mind like darts. The syllable only became louder, so that she couldn't even hear her own screaming, and in the dark she saw two eyes like cold stars, and a wicked set of long, sharp teeth set into a nasty grin…

Mirriam woke up just in time to receive a bucketful of lukewarm water in the face. Someone was standing over her with a wooden pail, calling her name. She felt like she was made of stone; her limbs refused to move at first. Her mind was sluggish as the pieces of her nightmare broke away and floated down from waking memory and into darker places. She lifted her head, and realized at that moment that her face had been resting in a puddle of dried, thin vomit.

"Damn it, Mirriam! Why can't I leave you alone for more than five minutes?!"

Mirriam blinked and felt around for something to wipe away the muck, and realized with dull surprise that she had no idea what had happened the night before.

Thavrin shook his head disapprovingly and said to Noster, "Thank you for helping me find her. Here," he handed the beggar a couple of septims, and then turned his attention to his sister. "Mirriam, you're lucky nothing bad happened to you! Do you realize how long we've been trying to wake you? You could have suffocated! Clean yourself off!" He shoved a square of dingy linen at her chest as she got to her feet, nearly knocking her onto her arse again. "I've been looking all over for you. I heard you were in town, but when I couldn't find you at the tavern I—" Thavrin stopped himself and sighed. He knew by now that lecturing her wouldn't do a thing. "Mirriam… here. Let me help you." He took the linen from her and wiped her face and neck. "It's all over the front of you… Do you have some spare clothes?"

Mirriam nodded. She decided to be glad her voice was hoarse and her mouth was cottony, because otherwise she might've said some things by now that she damn well knew she shouldn't.

"Okay. Go ahead and get changed, and wait here. I'll find us some breakfast… erm… lunch. Whatever. You look like you need some slaughterfish right now, so just wait." Before she could protest, Thavrin slipped around the corner of the building and left her standing behind the Winking Skeever, a shaded, grassy little patch between the building and the city wall.

Mirriam sighed and pulled her dress over her head. _Good thing it wasn't my favorite dress,_ she thought as she tossed it aside. Her blue dress was her best set of city clothes and, thankfully, was safe and clean inside her knapsack, which rested against the tavern wall. She inspected its contents with her good dress folded up on her bare knees, and realized that everything was still there. _Weird. Who was I with last night?_

She heard cheerful whistling out in the main square, and when she peeked around the corner, she saw Octieve strutting past toward the city gates. He caught Mirriam staring at him, and gave her a randy wink as he stepped out to enjoy the view of the bay.

_Oh._ Mirriam raised her eyebrows and shrugged her shoulders. She finished dressing, and walked out into the open. The sun was bright and high overhead. Mirriam groaned and shielded her eyes as she ducked into the shade of Radiant Raiment with Noster, ignoring the occasional disapproving stare from the townies.

"Hey." She said, nodding to Noster.

"Hey." He glanced at her out the corner of his good eye before returning his attention to the passersby.

"How much of a ruckus did I make last night?" she asked him in a low whisper.

"Wasn't that bad, actually," said Noster. "No brawling, no throwing bottles, no rough behavior. No one called the guards or anything. You even waited until you were done with Octieve before you threw up."

"Really?" _Well, there's something to feel good about._

"Oh yeah. I'd say you were behaving yourself this time."

"Good. Here," she added, handing him two septims. "Sorry you got dragged into this."

"Not a problem." Noster pocketed the coins with a smile, and Mirriam stepped back into the sunlight, finally ready to brave its oppressive rays.

She found Thavrin out in the marketplace, and they took their lunch of slaughterfish and raw pine thrush eggs in the cool shade of the arch, washing it all down with bottles of frost-chilled ale. The sound of the blacksmith's hammer and the creaking windmill were unwelcome accompaniments, but Mirriam ate without complaint, glad that her brother had decided to drop the issue of her commitment to dissolution.

Or not. "Mirriam, we have to talk."

_Shit…_

"I've been speaking to Kharjo, and he brought up a really good point about how skooma might be exacerbating your problem with Sheogorath…"

"What? Oh gods…"

"See, he's called 'Skooma Cat' for a reason. Apparently the Khajiit believe he's the cause of skooma's side effects, and frankly, I think they have a point. Why else would users act so crazy?"

"Thavrin…"

Thavrin crossed his arms and went in for the kill. "Either way, I think you should stop using it."

Mirriam's first impulse was to act out, to splutter and huff and tell Thavrin that _he_ was the crazy one. She ground her teeth and held her tongue though, and said, "Fine."

"Really?" Thavrin raised an eyebrow and looked at her.

"Yeah, really. The stuff 'round here's watery as all hell; it ain't worth the glass they keep it in, see? I'd be much better off selling the shit I already have and—"

Thavrin took a deep breath and braced himself for the hard part. "I think you should curb your drinking habits, too."

"_You what?!_"

"Mirriam…" Thavrin's tone carried a warning. He took her by the shoulders and stared her down. "Look at me, Mirriam. I want you to listen to my words; I want you to listen carefully, and I want you to _think_ about them before you respond. Okay?" Mirriam groaned, and Thavrin took this as a cue to continue. "Mirriam, I found you face-down in an alley today. You were asleep in your own vomit. Your vomit was a little reddish—red is bad, unless you ate a whole bunch of dye which, as drunk as you probably were, I still doubt you managed to do. You could have been robbed, _or worse._ Do you understand what I'm telling you? Do you even remember where you were last night—or what you did?"

Mirriam looked away and rubbed the back of her neck. "I… I have a bit of an idea…"

"Mirriam. If you don't slow down, you're going to kill yourself. The amount of alcohol you consume each day would do most people in, you know that?"

"No it wouldn't!"

"How much did you have yesterday? Be honest."

"I…" Mirriam gaped as she tried to do a quick count in her head, and she realized that she hadn't even been keeping track.

"Mirriam, promise me you'll cut back on the drinking."

"But…" Mirriam saw the look in his eyes, and she knew that he wasn't going to let this go. More importantly, she knew that he had a good point.

"You didn't used to be like this, Mirriam. My sister is smarter than this." He tightened his grip on her shoulders a bit as he looked at her pleadingly. "Please, Mirriam. I'll help you if you want."

Mirriam closed her eyes and sighed. She couldn't help but smile, as annoyed as she was, and she pulled him into a hug. "Dammit man, like I want you bitchin' at me all hours of the day… Fine. I'll take it easy from now on, okay?"

"Promise me."

"I promise. You might have to remind me, but don't take this as license to nag me to death!"

He hugged her tightly and smiled. "Good. I know things have been shitty lately, but we can't fall apart. We can't afford to. We both have a job to do, remember? These dumb Nords won't save themselves."

"Yeah, I guess." Mirriam sighed and leaned against the wall. "Half of them shit themselves whenever they see something that looks apocalyptic, and half of them get their arses kicked tryin' to fight it."

"And one of them is playing everyone else for a sucker."

"I dunno, Thavrin. He acts like he believes his own press, know what I mean?"

"Then he's deluded—all the worse. Besides, he's oppressing all your boyfriends and girlfriends in Windhelm, and we can't have that, can we?"

"Yeah, I told you that place sucks…" Mirriam's words trailed off as she realized what he'd said, and what the look on his face meant. She coughed and folded her arms. "Heh. I… I guess you heard some rumors…" Mirriam laughed weakly, trying to play it off.

Her brother was unimpressed. "The _whole neighborhood_, Mirriam? _Really?_"

"Thavrin…"

Thavrin waved a finger in her face as he scolded her once more. "Don't you 'Thavrin' me! This is what I was talking about, Mirriam. You can't just—"

"Hey! I was sober for that one, pal. Mostly."

"That's even worse! You keep it up, and you'll wind up pregnant! You wanna be tied down to some idiot just because you got his kid?"

"Please. We'll raise the kid ourselves if he's a slob. Not like we're incapable of child-rearing!"

"Mirriam, you can't have a kid. You don't even have a house to put him in!"

"Whaddaya call Breezehome, then?!" Mirriam glared at him with her hands on her hips. This conversation was getting ridiculous.

"I call it a run-down _shack_, that's what I call it!"

"Well it's better than that trash-heap you got goin' in Riften!"

"It's not a trash-heap!"

"Oh yeah? When's the last time you cleaned that skeever-hole?"

"_It's just fine you stupid ginger!_"

Thavrin had crossed a line then, and Mirriam's face grew hot. "I'm _not_ a ginger! My hair's _brown_!"

"That's what they all say!"

"_No they don't, you fetchin' creep! That doesn't even make sense!_"

"_Of course it does!_"

"_It can't be two colors at once, you dunce!_"

It was at this point, when Mirriam and Thavrin were nose-to-nose with each other's collars bunched up in their fists, when their faces were hot from all the anger and shouting, that they realized they had an audience.

A little blonde child was watching them with wide eyes, surrounded by her somewhat more timid friends. "What'cha fightin' for?" She asked. "You two should be separated. Then you can talk about it when you're not mad anymore!"

"Kid," Mirriam said, letting her brother go and straightening his collar, "we were just having a friendly debate. No harm done, right Thavrin?"

Thavrin nodded, smoothing out the rest of his shirt with a thin smile.

"Sure sounded like fighting," said the other, sullen-looking child.

"Yeah," said the third child, a boy with close-cropped brown hair. "You sound like my dad when Mom's yelling at him."

"Well, see," Thavrin said, "in the old country, we like to talk loudly. Our house was always noisy—it's what you do when you love each other. Right, sis?"

"Yyyyep," Mirriam said with a grin. "Familiarity breeds contempt, eh?"

The blonde girl looked unconvinced. Her little brow furrowed as she studied the two adults in front of her. "Well, that's not a healthy habit, and contempt's a bad thing—I know what that word means. You should use your indoor voice from now on."

Mirriam opened her mouth, but she wasn't really sure how to respond to that, or whether there was a productive response at all.

"Oh yeah? Who taught you that?" Asked Thavrin.

"My big brother!" She chirped, breaking into a grin. "He knows lots of stuff, like all the big words!"

"All of 'em, huh?" Thavrin muttered. "Does he know how to mind his own business?"

Mirriam elbowed him. "Plenty of people are gonna tell her to be quiet in her time—let the girl speak her mind! Hey," she turned to the girl again with a smile. "You like magic? Thavrin, show her that thing."

"Huh?"

"Y'know, the thing! The candlelight spell…"

Thavrin sighed. He wasn't sure he wanted to be used as a diversion, but he did it anyway, casting the spell and creating a small globe of multicolored light above his head. He was immediately rewarded with oohs and ahhs from the awestruck children, and with an encouraging smile from a young woman who was passing by.

"Wow, look at the colors!"

"Can you make an animal? I wanna see more magic!"

The children swarmed Thavrin all at once, tugging at his arm as they insisted that he join a game of tag. Mirriam grinned and waved goodbye to him, and strolled on down to the pawn shop to see if she could find some new books to trade for a few scrolls that she wasn't using. Now that she thought of it, she wouldn't mind having a house with more shelf space. It was a pain to carry around all those books; they were light individually, but they had a way of adding up, and keeping the rare finds with her during her travels always made her nervous.

Later on, after Mirriam enjoyed a good, long nap on top of the city walls where the wind carried the smell of saltwater and the shadows of fleet hawks, she and Thavrin met up in the Winking Skeever. The house was packed that night; there were morsels of gossip to trade, personal tragedies to be forgotten, politics to discuss, and items to be fenced. Mead and wine flowed like water, and the music of Lisette's lute filled the smoky air above their heads. The lamplight glowed golden-warm and stretched its fingers across all corners with cheerful triumph as people sat together, hunched over their daily bread and mugs of mead. The barkeep talked his long-suffering son's ear off as he wiped down the counter for the tenth time that night, unable to keep himself still amidst all this life and energy. Solitude was a wretched place on paper, its history filled with murder, warfare, and madness, but you wouldn't have known it on that night, when old men sang and drank outside under the beam of the twin moons, and when torch bugs danced with diaphanous luna moths among colorful banners that fluttered in the gentle sea-breeze.

Thavrin and Mirriam couldn't possibly be cross with each other on such a night; the opportunity for carousing and merriment was too compelling. Mirriam sat in the corner with the old spellsword Belrand, engaged in an arm-wrestling match that would have had the potential to get ugly in Markarth or Riften, possibly in Whiterun, definitely in Windhelm, and which would not have occurred at all in sober Falkreath or in the barren sisters, Dawnstar and Winterhold. Thavrin watched it devolve into a thoroughly ridiculous thumb-wrestling contest with his feet folded one over the other on the table next to empty bottles, his chair leaned back on two legs and his arm slung over the back. Amusement danced in his eyes, a wistful smile was upon his black lips, and for the time being, his troubles were far away from his heart.

Finally the stalemate broke when Belrand pinned down Mirriam's thumb for five seconds.

"Hey, I thought you were supposed to count to ten!" Mirriam handed over the septims anyway. She wasn't particularly worried about money after Thavrin spent the day transmuting metal and breaking everyone else's banks.

"You want to keep going? I sure don't—look at how lonely my wine is!" Belrand sat back with his jug of spiced wine and took a long drink of it. Mirriam had decided to stick to ale that night, for her brother's sake, but she couldn't help coveting the sweeter, stronger stuff that Evette sold.

Thavrin noticed something out the corner of his eye, and grinned. "Hey Mirriam," he whispered, "don't look now, but I think the innkeeper's son is staring at you."

"Huh?"

"Yeah, I bet he's been watching you all night! Did you do something to encourage him yesterday?"

Mirriam threw a scrap of bread at her brother and laughed. "Gimme a break. Wasn't he the guy who was cheering at Roggvir's execution? What a prick!" When she looked up, she saw him put away his broom and grab a bottle of spiced wine from the counter. "Hey, what's he up to now?"

"Maybe he's gonna proposition someone. Maybe you gave him an idea, huh?" Thavrin sat up and elbowed her with a grin.

"Shut up! No way a milk-drinker like him'd have the sack…"

The two of them leaned forward in their seats to watch as Corpulus Vinius's son cleared his throat, waited for the lady from the apothecary to notice him, and then gave up and set the bottle down in front of her as he mumbled what was probably a very unimpressive pick-up line, or the tattered ruins of a decent one that he'd messed up. Vivienne accepted it politely—who would refuse Evette San's spiced wine?—and promptly returned to her conversation with Gisli, Erikur's sister. He waited a moment, and when the redness of his face became too much for him to handle he slinked away to his old broom.

"What a chump…" Thavrin shook his head and bit into an apple, his third one that night.

Mirriam snickered. "What'd he think was going to happen?" she said, "a man gives a woman some wine, and he acts like he's rewriting the Elder Scrolls!" Old Belrand got a kick out of that, which pleased Mirriam. She was about to go back to her cups and leave it be, but then she had a wicked idea. She whispered her idea to Thavrin, whose inhibitions were lowered just enough by the booze for him to agree. On the count of three, the two of them stuck their fingers in their mouths and whistled loudly at Vivienne.

"Hey sweet-cheeks!" Mirriam hollered, "You look lonely!"

"Yeah, why don't you sit with us? There's just enough room on my lap!" Thavrin grabbed his crotch and Mirriam waved her over, and the two of them howled with laughter as she dismissed the two of them with a rude gesture and a toss of her long, brown hair. There wasn't a hint of a blush on her brave, fair face; Vivienne knew Thavrin by name after he'd spent so much time at the apothecary, and knew enough about him to tell that he was full of shit. She sipped her wine with a good-humored smirk and couldn't help taking a peek at Sorex to see how he handled being upstaged in front of half the town.

As if his face hadn't been red enough already, Sorex Vinius's turned nearly purple like a beet. He dropped his broom and ducked out of sight, much to Mirriam and Thavrin's amusement.

By then the crowd was thinning out, and the moons had passed their zenith. Mirriam sold off the last of her skooma to a grateful and slightly drunk Corpulus in exchange for some coins and a fresh pie, which she took outside to eat with her brother.

"Hey," Thavrin said with his mouth full, "do you think we could stop by the Pelagius wing?"

"Why?" Mirriam licked her fingers and wiped them absentmindedly on her apron.

Thavrin swallowed and washed the last of the pie down with mead. "Well for one thing, the innkeeper's son might smother us in our sleep after we called attention to him like that. For another, maybe the Mad God will be there."

"Right. And if he is, you crouch down behind him, and I'll push!" Mirriam shoved her hands out in front of her, as if she was knocking over Sheogorath.

Thavrin pursed his lips. "Somehow I don't think that plan will accomplish anything. Here," he reached into his vest and produced a small bottle of sleeping draught. "That's an interesting recipe you gave me. It drains the stamina until there's none left, and then takes a hint of the subject's health away—just enough to put all of the body's reserves to restoring itself—and the exhausted subject falls into a deep sleep. I didn't think it'd work, but look…" he motioned to Noster, who was sprawled out on his back by a stack of barrels.

"You poisoned him?"

"I prefer to call it 'medicating via pickpocket.' It sounds nicer, don't you think? Anyway, there's no way I was gonna let you have any of this without testing it on someone else first!"

Mirriam frowned. "Don't pick on the hobos, Thavrin. But thanks. I look forward to sleeping like a human for once." She took the bottle and gave her brother a hug. "Now let's go check out the Pelagius Wing."

Once they got past the shockingly idle and inattentive guard in the foyer of the Blue Palace, Mirriam's suspicions were confirmed. "There's no sign of him, and it's just as much of a pigsty as ever. Now what?"

"Umm… we wait?" Thavrin sat down next to a bedroll and pulled out a book. "Get some sleep. I'll keep watch."

"Here? On that? There's a bunch of soft, warm beds at—"

"—at the inn where we just pissed off one of the innkeeper's children. Let's sleep here, where it's safe."

Mirriam shrugged, too tired to argue. She made herself as comfortable as she could in the old bedroll, and it helped that they had several bearskins to use as padding. She downed the little vial of sleeping draught, and was surprised by how quickly it went to work on her. "G'night, bro…"

"Sleep tight, Mirriam," he said distractedly. He was too busy staring at a note he'd tucked into the book earlier that day, one he'd received the moment he stepped into town. On it was a black hand and, beneath that, the words "we know." Thavrin sighed and rested his head against the cold stone wall, wondering how safe the Pelagius Wing really was. He knew he wouldn't be getting any sleep that night, so he decided to let his mind wander, trying to guide it toward happier times, and not finding anything in particular to be happy about.

Thavrin wound up spending most of the night staring at the Elder Scroll they'd found in Blackreach. He and Mirriam didn't know what to do with it now, after they'd gone through so much trouble to acquire the thing. It was heavy—heavier than any book he'd ever seen, and it surely weighed as much as a piece of armor. Thavrin carried it with him at all times now, like a reminder. It was all he had left now; just a scroll and a sister, and he found that he didn't want to carry the scroll anymore. No matter what he tried to do, everything was washed away in the end; it was like building a house on a beach. He really should have given it to Mirriam, or to the College, but for some reason he couldn't make himself do it, not just yet.

Thavrin shuddered. He glanced up at the cluttered storage room, feeling as though he was being watched. Sure enough, two glistening red eyes stared back at him. The apparition sat on the stairwell with a predatory grin; it whispered softly, cruelly, beckoning to him.

Thavrin got a hold of himself in the only way he knew—he covered his eyes and counted to ten. If it was still there when he looked up, he'd stab it. If he could. He knew the moment the thought crossed his mind that he wouldn't have the guts to lift the knife against his dear, dead Erandur. He barely had it in him to _think_ the very name, let alone speak it—the name that had escaped the lips of neither him nor his sister since that night underground, when his frame lie wreathed in blood and mud, cooling and still in the pale gleam of the subterrestrial grove.


End file.
